


Sympathy for the Devil

by FrancesHouseman



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Aurors, Blood Pacts, First Time, Grief/Mourning, Hogwarts, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, M/M, Magical Creatures, Masturbation, Ministry of Magic, Post-Movie 2: Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, Prophecy, Prophetic Visions, Teacher!Dumbledore, Unspeakables (Harry Potter), a cup of tea cures all ills, longer plotty fic, magical creature death, muggle beer, secrets and confessions, threat, traumatic memories from WWI
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-25
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2019-10-16 01:07:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 25,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17539781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrancesHouseman/pseuds/FrancesHouseman
Summary: Dumbledore sighs. “It seems I have another job too though, one I’m loathe to do but it seems to be mine all the same.”“It doesn’t have to be yours alone,” Theseus says, determined, although saying it out loud makes his ears burn.





	1. Chapter 1

 

Theseus is unaccustomed to guests, since he and Leta hadn’t invited many. Their world had narrowed down to work and each other, and it had been a comfortable existence, now blown wide open in the aftermath of her death.

Leta’s death had prompted quite a number of guests to visit Theseus’s home, including Newt who had called several times, and once with Tina in tow. Well-meaning colleagues and neighbours had brought casseroles and condolences but after three weeks their numbers are falling off.

Theseus had eaten the last of the casseroles the night before, alone at a dining table that seems comically oversized for one person. Once it was finished he had banished the left overs, along with the plates. And the cutlery. He’s getting really good at banishing things.

A couple of days after returning to London Theseus had freed the house elf, since a one-person home hardly had need of one. The house is still immaculate though, and his guests had seemed surprised about this, perhaps expecting Theseus to be an emotional wreck living amongst the pieces of his life. In truth, any mess gets banished. If there’s anything that needs laundering beyond a _scourgify_ , Theseus banishes it. If bath water takes too long to drain, he banishes that. Dirt and dust don’t stand a chance. When he notices that the mantelpiece clock has been knocked askew, instead of straightening it he banishes that too.

A tap at the window on the Tuesday morning of the forth week startles him into spilling the tea he’s pouring, ruining the table cloth, which he banishes absently. It’s an owl bearing a note in Stebbins’ careful hand, asking Theseus to please bring his jobberknoll feather quill into the office today. It means that some poor sod is going to be cross-examined at length. The jobberknoll quill had been a birthday gift from Newt, years ago, and it twitches when a person is being untruthful. It’s easy to disguise in interviews as an ordinary quill, and it means that the person they’re bringing in must be too important or respected, or both, to dose with veritaserum.

The owl is also carrying a small parcel from Newt, probably those American biscuits Tina was talking about. He takes the note with him but leaves the parcel on the table for later; something to come home to.

A patch of spilt tea sits on the bare table-top beside the package, un-banished and leaving a watermark. The teak has no business being so shiny and perfect anyway, not anymore.

 

****

 

At three minutes past five, after another long day of paperwork, Theseus is standing at an apparition point, wand at the ready, when he becomes aware of somebody making a beeline for him, walking swiftly. He could turn and acknowledge them but it’s the end of a long day, and probably just another piece of paper he forgot to sign. He decides that whatever it is can wait for the morning and turns instead into his apparition.

It’s only a short hop to Holland Park but he’s surprised to find that his pursuer is determined and skilful enough to follow him. He’s even more surprised that it’s Albus Dumbledore. “I just wanted to return your quill,” Dumbledore says apologetically, and his smile is charming as he holds out the quill for Theseus to take. “How have you been? I didn’t get the chance at the funeral to say how sorry I am about Leta.”

“I’m holding up alright, thanks,” Theseus says, his rote response to such enquiries. “So, it was you they wanted the quill for.”

“It was indeed. No doubt they hoped the type of feather would go unnoticed.” Dumbledore’s eyes dance with amusement.

“I’m sorry for the way you’re being treated,” Theseus says. Travers seems intent on making an enemy of Dumbledore for no good reason Theseus can see, and it irks him. Theseus has always liked and trusted Dumbledore instinctively.

“I suppose it’s understandable, given my history with Grindelwald. I do wish the dungeons were a little warmer though, and the shackles a little looser.”

Theseus winces.

Dumbledore shakes his head, smiling. “If you’re not in a hurry to be anywhere, I could tell you all about it over a drink?”

And, of course, Theseus doesn’t have anywhere else to be, and Dumbledore must know it. There’s a kindness in Dumbledore’s offer that makes Theseus suspect it’s made out of pity. He can’t stand the idea. “I can’t, sorry. I’m just fetching groceries before heading over to Newt’s.”

“Ah. Well. In that case, kindly let me escort you to the greengrocers,” Dumbledore offers, which is ridiculous because it’s less than a hundred yards away.

These streets have been Theseus’s home for years but crossing the street now, navigating gaslit puddles and horse mess with Dumbledore, Theseus has the strange sensation that he’s stepped onto the set of a play, or into somebody else’s life.

“Thank Newt again for the loan of the sand-fairy, will you?” Dumbledore says as they reach the shop, “My students found him quite droll.”

“Newt and his creatures,” Theseus says, shaking his head and offering a small smile. At least Newt had survived events in Paris, something he is fiercely grateful for. Suddenly he wants nothing more than to take Dumbledore up on his offer of a drink but can’t find the words to change his mind without making a fool of himself.

“A good evening then,” Dumbledore says. He nods and disapparates, leaving Theseus to his regret.

 

****

 

When Theseus gets home with a bag of groceries he doesn’t really need, the package from Newt has been torn open. On inspection, there is nothing inside. Theseus curses. The brown wrapping paper looks suspiciously chewed, which probably means there’s another beast on the loose. At least it’s a small one this time. He searches but finds nothing.

He throws the packaging away and writes a scathing note for Newt, which he tucks it into his coat. He can owl it from work tomorrow.

 

****

 

“Theseus!” Dumbledore shouts over the hubbub of homeward-bound Ministry employees on Wednesday evening. The man seems to enjoy saying his name. Theseus can’t remember anyone looking so pleased to see him before. “It’s better weather today. Perhaps we could walk?”

“Yes, alright,” Theseus says. They apparate together to street level and fall into step. “They haven’t been grilling you in the dungeons again, have they?”

“Actually, no. Today I was interviewed on level nine, and no shackles. Still chilly.”

Theseus laughs. “A whole level up.”

“They wanted me to sign agreements: _I solemnly swear to destroy the blood pact_ ; _I hereby_ _vow my allegiance to the Ministry_ , that kind of thing.”

“And did you?”

“Some I did and some I didn’t.” Everything is amusing to Dumbledore. It’s infectious. “Is there any word from Tina’s sister, the legilimens?” he asks, becoming serious. “Queenie, isn’t it?”

Theseus shakes his head, “No, nothing. Tina is heartbroken.” Newt hadn’t said as much, and Theseus had respected his tact, but it seems certain by now that Queenie has thrown her lot in with Grindelwald. None of Tina or Jacob’s letters and pleas have been answered.

“That’s a pity. Poor Tina. And poor Jacob.”

“She’s a powerful legilimens,” Theseus says, more to keep the conversation going than anything. “A great ally for Grindelwald.”

“Just so. But perhaps she’s not lost to us yet.”

Dumbledore turns what looks to be a muggle cigarette lighter over in his hand as they walk. At Theseus’s questioning look he hands it over.

“Try it,” he offers, “Only, not just here.”

They find a bright but deserted side-street and Theseus clicks the device. It sucks the nearest lamplight out of existence, leaving their patch of pavement dim and suddenly more intimate. He swallows. “How does it work?” 

“You can put it back,” Dumbledore says, showing him how to adjust the switch. His fingertips brush Theseus’s knuckles. “Like this. Go on.”

Theseus clicks it again and the moment is ruined by yellow light. “Ingenious,” he says, returning the device. He tries to remember what a casual distance between colleagues should feel like as they continue their walk. No further invitations to drinks are forthcoming by the time they reach the greengrocers at Holland Park, and Theseus silently berates himself again. “Well, here we are then,” he observes with a sinking feeling.

“Good evening, Theseus.” Dumbledore says, winking before he disapparates.

There’s no one around to see Theseus blush.

 

****

 

Home alone, Theseus imagines another dimension, somewhere where all the banished things end up. It would be full of Theseus’s plates, and lots of dead bodies probably. Criminals tended to banish dead bodies, Theseus knows this from work. He notices that the apples in his fruit bowl have gone soft and absently banishes them. Then he notices that the fruit bowl is marred by grimy apple mush and banishes it too, immediately feeling guilty.

The bowl had been fine crystal, an engagement gift from friends of Leta’s in Spain. He decides to get hold of some disposable paper picnic plates in future, and some of those wooden forks dispensed by muggle pie sellers, in order to minimise the damage caused by his new nihilistic tendencies.

 

****

 

Dumbledore is not at the Ministry on Thursday, or on Friday, and Theseus tells himself it doesn’t matter. The house is particularly cold and lonely when he gets home and no amount of warming charms seem to help.

The weekend passes slowly. He does go to Newt’s place on Sunday evening for dinner. Tina is there too, and they eat in forced cheeriness. Nobody mentions Leta. It’s not awkward exactly; they know each other too well for awkwardness, but Theseus can’t help thinking that they would be happier without him there. He understands now why Newt didn’t come over more, when Leta had been around. The feeling of being a third wheel, and a miserable, pitiable third wheel at that, is not something he enjoys.

On Monday evening Dumbledore still isn’t there and disappointment crashes down on Theseus. He apparates directly to his front gate and banishes a slightly overgrown French lavender that Leta had planted.

On Tuesday, however, Dumbledore is waiting for him at the apparition point. “New suit?” Theseus says, before he can think better of it. There’s a crisp newness to Dumbledore’s trousers, which are a shade darker than last week’s, lending Dumbledore a slightly more formal air.

“You noticed!” Dumbledore beams. “Are we walking?”

“Why not.” They apparate up and receive a filthy look from a muggle in a bowler hat when they emerge from the alleyway together. “Don’t tell me they dragged you in for questioning again, surely they’ve got all they want from you by now?”

“Actually, I asked for the meeting this time. I’ve been trying to break the blood pact and there are a few items in the Ministry’s possession that might speed up the process. The bureaucracy is quite incredible though.”

Theseus snorts. “That’s an understatement. I’m drowning in paperwork; most of us are.” He glances at Dumbledore and makes a decision. “If there’s anything I can do to help?”

Dumbledore acknowledges the offer for what it is, with a grateful smile. “Thank you. As it happens, maybe you can help. If I’m here again tomorrow would it be alright to call in?”

“Morning or afternoon?”

“Oh, afternoon I should think.”

“Then yes, of course. Which level did they have you on today?”

“There was a spare office on level seven,” Dumbledore confides, smugly. “I appear to be moving up in the world.”

They walk together quietly, taking the path by Hyde Park this time, alongside Rotten Row. Some of His Majesty’s Household Cavalry canter by, prompting Theseus to relay the ongoing saga of Bunty and the kelpie.

“I taught Bunty too, of course,” Dumbledore says. “The girl has a Celtic heart wilder than any kelpie, not that you’d know it. Her family are from Scotland I believe, somewhere near Inverness. Where do they plan to release the creature, once he’s healed?”

“Well, it can’t go back to Limerick, the muggles have made sure of it with their new dam,” Theseus says. He shrugs.  

“Perhaps Bunty can take him home,” Dumbledore muses.

There are posters around the Royal Albert Hall advertising a Russian muggle who can apparently conjure music from thin air. ‘THEREMIN’ the posters proclaim, ‘Music from the ether. Two thumbs up!’

“I don’t know about _from the ether_ ,” Dumbledore says, as he casts a silencing charm around them. “Perhaps from the trees though…” He raises his wand like a muggle conductor and begins to make sweeping gestures. A sighing begins in the winter branches, like the memory of summer leaves long since scattered. The sighing becomes a soughing with some persuasion, which in turn becomes a series of recognisable notes, not unlike the pan pipes.  

The music is haunting, and at first it’s nothing Theseus recognises. Then Dumbledore coaxes the notes into a tune that’s recognisable and Theseus says, “I know this.” It’s a sad melody, intimate and melancholy, and he has to swallow down a surge of heartbreak.

“Schubert’s Serenade,” Dumbledore says, his concentration on the patterns of notes his wand is drawing down from the trees. The key of the melody changes from minor to major and Theseus is enchanted. The spell is broken too soon though, by a muggle couple who appear at the far end of the path. Dumbledore glances at him apologetically, lowering his wand and allowing the music and silencing charm to fade. Mundane London reasserts itself around them.

“That was lovely,” Theseus says, meaning it most sincerely, “Enchanting. Where did you learn to do it?”

“Years ago, before the war,” Dumbledore says, seeming pleased, although he doesn’t say where. “I can teach you how one day, if you’d like.” The muggle couple pass by, and when they’re out of sight Dumbledore grins and adds, “Nothing like an opportunity for showing off.”

Theseus smiles and shakes his head. He feels better, just at the moment, than he has for ages. “I’d like to learn how, when you have time to teach me.” He thinks about the boundaries of decency and the shackles of propriety as they continue their walk, cutting their parallel paths through Kensington; close but never meeting.

Unexpectedly, it starts to rain. The droplets are large and they come down fast, as though a faucet has been turned. Theseus casts an umbrella charm and Dumbledore steps neatly beneath it, linking Theseus’s wand arm with his own.

Dumbledore’s arm is thick with muscle and he carries the faintest tantalising smell of vetiver. Theseus is dismayed, if not surprised, to find that he urgently wants to follow it to its source. Shouldn’t Dumbledore have cast his own umbrella charm? They’re wizards for Merlin’s sake: they could have just apparated to somewhere warm and dry. And yet there’s nowhere else in the world Theseus wants to apparate to at the moment, no matter how warm or how dry it might be.

“Where did that come from?” Theseus says shakily, trying to sound normal. _A convergence_ , he thinks. _A convergence of parallel paths_. The deluge is strangely soothing to his overwrought heartbeat, hammering down around them as though it understands. His feeling of disconnect from reality is back: this can’t be Theseus’s life.

Satisfaction radiates from Dumbledore and Theseus feels lightheaded. He wonders whether he would fall now, if Dumbledore let go of his arm. “You know, rain is the real elixir of life,” Dumbledore says, eventually.

Theseus can’t think of a reply.

 

****

 

In his office on Wednesday, Theseus waits on tenterhooks until an apologetic note arrives for him mid-morning saying that something else has come up. Dumbledore’s writing is just like the man himself: refined but not showy. Perfect, effortless and never simple. Theseus spends far too much time analysing it. He slips the note into his case when he leaves and keeps it by his bed like a lovesick schoolboy.

 

****

 

“You have a guest,” Daisy McQueen sing songs, tapping perfunctorily before opening Theseus’s office door.

“Dumbledore,” Theseus stands, “I wasn’t expecting you today.” It’s Friday afternoon and Theseus had mostly been clock-watching.

“If it’s not a good time…”

“No! No, it’s a good time. Please, come in. Thanks Daisy.”

Dumbledore is carrying a large paper-wrapped package under his arm, which he lays on Theseus’s desk before hanging up his coat and trilby on the hat stand.

Daisy catches Theseus’s eye and gives him the _what are you up to now?_ eyebrow on the way out, which he ignores.

“Have you ever heard of the Achaemenid Codex?” Dumbledore asks, taking the visitor’s chair.

“Well yes, of course. It was rumoured to be in Egypt at the turn of the century but-” Dumbledore nods, looking smug. Theseus eyes the package in dawning realisation. “You’re not telling me that you’ve...”

“Not many people know that the Ministry has it,” Dumbledore says, unfastening the string and removing the paper to reveal an enormous black tome. “I do, because I brought it here myself, many years ago.”

“From Egypt?” Dumbledore nods and makes a magnanimous _go-ahead_ gesture with his hand. Theseus runs his fingers over the cover. The leather could be new, except he knows that it must be a preservation enchantment since the book is at least two thousand years old. His fingertips bump over silver studded stars. “And there’s something in here about blood pacts?”

“Yes and no. Let me show you something else though.” Dumbledore rounds the desk, turning the book towards Theseus and leaning close over his shoulder as he finds the place. “There,” he says. “It’s what makes this particular book so dangerous. It’s safe to cast over though, I’ve done it enough times.”

Theseus draws his wand over the text, right to left, translating the words into modern-day English with the _cognosco_ charm as he goes.  He gasps as the meanings become clear. “But there are hundreds.”

“All different. All with the same result.”

“This one: _Death by implosion to form a diamond_? What a way to go.”

“Death by screaming agony, death by blood loss, death by unending sleep,” Dumbledore reels off, “Transfiguration into stone, and you can even find death by ritual ecstasy further down the page. The Ancient Persians had death down to a fine art, and of course sometimes the subjects went willingly.”

How many muggles had been tormented to death by these very words? The urge to back away from the book takes hold but it would mean backing up into Dumbledore and that would be awkward, however appealing. “This one here,” Theseus says, tapping it with his wand tip, “Is this one the killing curse as we know it?” The section speaks of nihilation of life in green light.

“I believe it’s an early version of the modern unforgivable, yes,” Dumbledore says. He rests a hand on Theseus’s shoulder as he reaches over him to close the book. “We have an audience,” he says, sotto voce in Theseus’s ear.

Theseus glances up and catches Stebbins peeping through the small glass window in the door. He gives him a little wave, making Stebbins startle and disappear. 

Dumbledore huffs a laugh. “It’s mostly dark magic,” he says, re-wrapping the Codex, “But it’s not all death and torture.”

“And the blood pact?”

Dumbledore gives him a confidential smile. “The ancients used many more charms to imbibe objects with magic than we do today. From golems to broomsticks. It’s fascinating.” He tucks the book back under his arm and retrieves his hat and coat. Theseus tries not to feel disappointed. “Years ago I used this book to… help me explore the idea. I was young and curious, and while I was studying I came across something else, something I disregarded at the time because it had no bearing on what I was trying to achieve.”

He doesn’t elaborate and Theseus isn’t sure whether to press him. “Stebbins will gossip, I’m afraid,” he says instead, catching another glimpse of Stebbins passing by his window.

“And that’s really what I wanted to talk to you about,” Dumbledore says. “I suggested to Travers that I would need help breaking the blood pact and he was very obliging, as I had hoped he might be.”

“Did he offer Stebbins?” Travers would certainly have jumped at the chance of setting one of his team to spy on Dumbledore.

“He offered himself actually,” Dumbledore says, eyes crinkling. “But I’m afraid I rather insisted it had to be you. I hope you don’t mind.”

A warm feeling blooms inside Theseus. “Travers wouldn’t have chosen me,” he says, allowing himself the smile that’s trying to break free. “He thinks I’m too trusting.”

“Come and find me at Hogwarts.” Dumbledore suggests, lightly. He sets his hat on his head, eyes never leaving Theseus’s. “Sunday, if you’re free?”

“Sunday,” Theseus says. “I’ll be there.”

When Dumbledore has left the office, the clock ticks ever more slowly towards five. Theseus thinks about Dumbledore’s colleagues at Hogwarts, beginning with Minerva McGonagall. She’s one of the brightest, if not _the_ brightest, witch of the age. Indeed, Dumbledore is well liked and fiercely protected by all of the Hogwarts faculty; Theseus would know because he’s tried to get information on Dumbledore in the past, on Travers’ orders, and it was like trying to get blood from the proverbial stone. 

Surrounded by so many old and trusted friends, equipped between them with every magical skill under the sun, why would Dumbledore ask for Theseus’s help? He goes over it from every angle before coming to the only conclusion that fits: Dumbledore doesn’t really need help at all.

Theseus is so busy enjoying the implications of this as he leaves for the day, to the exclusion of his surroundings, that it’s a complete surprise to find Dumbledore at their apparition point. He doesn’t even bother trying to hide his pleasure.

“Would you believe the paperwork took even longer than I thought?” Dumbledore says. They apparate up and start to walk but Theseus really, really doesn’t want to go home. He glances to a muggle public house as they pass. Warm light spills out onto the street through hundreds of tiny diamonds of thick leaded glass. It looks welcoming. “Time for a swift one?” Dumbledore suggests.

 _Finally_. Theseus grins. “Yes, I’d like that.”

It’s standing room only inside the pub, with all the tables and seats occupied by the Friday after-work crowd. Dumbledore sips his muggle beer with a contemplative look. A little of the froth remains on the hair bordering his upper lip.

Theseus licks his lips and takes a swig. It’s disgusting. “Merlin,” he splutters, “It’s like butterbeer that’s been through a hippogriff.”

“A dead hippogriff,” Dumbledore agrees, but as they drink the taste grows on Theseus, along with the urge to lick away the foam.

Theseus asks about Egypt and Dumbledore tells him about the wonders of architectural arithmancy built into the Great Pyramids at Giza. Theseus knows some of it already, of course, but Dumbledore has a knack for simplifying theory down until understanding is effortless. It’s possible that Dumbledore’s students receive an education at Hogwarts without really realising it’s happening.

In the very first years of the twentieth century, at a time when muggle archaeologists were uncovering new tombs and inscriptions every week, Dumbledore had been sent to Egypt to do some damage control, since some of the inscriptions being unearthed contained powerful enchantments. “For example,” Dumbledore explains, “There was a charm to literally raise a dead pharaoh’s body to the stars, on what would have more or less been an early flying carpet. There were even illustrations and dimensions. We had been prepped to confiscate and obliviate as necessary but then the muggles began to explain it all away themselves anyway, as religious metaphor.” He takes a drink and assesses his audience. “I’m not boring you, am I?”

Theseus could listen to Dumbledore listing potions ingredients and never be bored, but he’s caught by the idea and genuinely interested. At Hogwarts he had been one of the only students to stay awake in Binns’ sixth- and seventh-year classes. “Not at all. Please go on.”

“Well, muggles have similar metaphors in their modern-day religions, you see,” Dumbledore continues, “So I suppose it made sense to write-off what were really ancient magical instruction manuals as symbolic religious ceremonies.”

Dumbledore brings Egypt to life, so that Theseus can almost feel the sand in his own socks. Newt will be interested to hear about the jewel scarab beetles; creatures that were reinvigorated after thousands of years when the tombs were cracked open. Luckily for the muggle archaeologists, most of the ancient curses were quietly disarmed by the wizards. Dumbledore talks about these adventures as though he had been a junior team member, mostly along for the ride, but Theseus knows the man well enough to read between the lines.

Their drinks don’t last long enough, so Theseus offers to buy more. Muggle coins are foreign and awkward, and he has apprehensions aplenty but the bar tender doesn’t seem to notice.

“Level three today,” Dumbledore says loudly, to be heard over the hubbub, as Theseus hands him a second pint.  

“Level two on Monday?” They’re forced to step apart, to make way for a tipsy muggle carrying four pints at once. The man slops beer on the floor but misses both wizards. 

“Level one on Monday. With your whole department no less, and Fawley too.”

This tickles Theseus. Dumbledore has played his way up the Ministry in such a short time that Travers must be apoplectic. And perhaps the beer is also to blame. “Sorry,” he says, trying to rein in his laughter.  He takes an elbow in the back from another muggle, jolting him further into Dumbledore’s space. “Everyone knows how Fawley looks to you for guidance, it’s just Travers…”

Dumbledore shares the joke, although Theseus is shrewd enough to realise that it’s his own amusement that’s mostly responsible for Dumbledore’s pleasure.

As his giddiness subsides, something releases inside Theseus that had been tightly wound ever since Père Lachaise. They sip their drinks quietly, letting the hubbub of the muggle crowd wash over them. “Do you ever just want to leave?” Theseus asks abruptly. “You could, I think, if you wanted to. If anyone could just disappear then it would be you.”

Dumbledore doesn’t lose his smile but his eyes change; older somehow and touched by sadness. Theseus looks away, wishing that he could take it back. “I know; your job, your students. Everyone would miss you, we all would.”

“It’s kind of you to say so.” Dumbledore sighs. “It seems I have another job too though, one I’m loathe to do but it seems to be mine all the same.”

“It doesn’t have to be yours alone,” Theseus says, determined, although saying it out loud makes his ears burn. He doesn’t regret it though, and the grateful look Dumbledore gives him makes him glad. 

There’s stillness between them. It doesn’t last long, only long enough for Theseus to imagine Dumbledore kissing him, and once he’s imagined it it’s all he can think about. “Running away is a child’s fantasy,” Dumbledore says, “But we’re allowed our dreams.”

 _I’d go with you,_ Theseus thinks, _Right now, I’d ditch everything and go off with you on a mad whim._ He gathers his magic and thinks, _Take me with you_ , as fiercely as he can.

Dumbledore’s smile falls briefly into surprise, before returning like sunshine.

 

****

 

The muggles had called it Happy Hour at the public house; something to do with two pints for a bob and a tanner, whatever that meant. Theseus thinks back on it later as The Golden Hour. He feels Dumbledore’s absence like a physical loss, which is foolish because they have never touched, not really. Not unless you counted the umbrella, or the lingering handshake they had shared in the ringing silence of the evening before parting ways.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

Hogwarts is enormous, outside and in, but Theseus had already known that. What he was in no way prepared for is how small the students have become, even the older ones.  

Dumbledore is in his classroom, already preparing potions ingredients. His desk has been enlarged so that it can also support The Achaemenid Codex, which lies open on top.

“Come in!” He beckons Theseus over and hands him a bunch of fresh bay leaves. “They need to be shredded,” he says apologetically. “I would have done it earlier but I have this student called McLaggen and, well. Let’s say he always has the most inventive reasons for breaking the rules.”

“What are we making?” Theseus shrugs off his coat and accepts the leaves. It’s strange to be brewing again at school; like stepping back in time.

“You remember I said I came across an interesting passage in the Codex? It was a recipe for tea.”

“Tea.” Theseus shoots Dumbledore an unimpressed sideways glance.

“Cleansing tea, to be more specific. It’s part of a wider ritual to cleanse the spirit, in preparation for raising a protector. Not a golem precisely, but something similar.”

“But we’re not raising a golem,” Theseus checks, because you can never be too sure with Dumbledore.

“No indeed. But the ritual requires cleansing and purity: of the spirit, conscience and blood,” Dumbledore recites. “Not in the usual pureblood sense though; this kind of cleansing can be achieved with tea.”

“And it will help to separate your blood from his?”

“That’s the plan. There will still be a formidable magical bond to break afterwards, of course, but separating the blood is half the task. Could you pass me the aloe gel?”

The potion isn’t one of the most exciting looking ones Theseus has ever seen. In fact, it looks a lot like dull-coloured tea. “What were you trying to animate,” Theseus asks, “Before, when you came across this ritual?”

Dumbledore smiles and the lamplight dances in his eyes. He hands Theseus his wand and says, “Counter clockwise, nice and slow.”

Theseus stirs.

When the tea is ready, they go through to the small room at the top of the staircase, where a little table awaits with two armchairs before a cosy fire. “There were some other parts to the ritual,” Dumbledore says, gesturing for Theseus to sit, “But I performed them this morning. I had to bathe in a river outside the grounds.”

“That must have been nippy. I take it a bath wouldn’t have been enough?”

“It had to be running water, so a bath, or indeed the lake, weren’t really options. It was a cold but lovely spot. Perhaps we can bathe there together in the summer.”

“Um, yes,” Theseus fumbles, and his cheeks flush with pleasure in the warmth of Dumbledore’s smile.

“Now, this last part of the ritual is more involved I’m afraid, and it’s the reason I asked you to come. The cleansing of the spirit demands confession. More precisely, seven confessions. Secrets never voiced before.”

Theseus’s internal state of alert notches up a level. “And then you will be… worthy?”

“Grindelwald keeps many secrets and, by now, unless he’s found a new confident, his blood should be rendered ‘impure’ by the measures of this ritual. With a bit of luck, my blood, mingled for the moment with his,” Dumbledore takes the pact from around his neck and holds it up for inspection, “Will separate out afterwards. Like oil and water. The change to myself should be quite profound on a magical level, although I’m not clear about how long it will last. A few years by my best guess.”

“Is more blood involved in this part?” Theseus asks, eyeing the pact in its decorative container. Dumbledore places it on the little table beside the tea. This isn’t Theseus’s first ancient ritual, and they usually demand more blood than you think they’re going to.

“Just a little.” Dumbledore draws his wand across his palm, scoring a deep incision without any hint of discomfort. Blood wells up quickly but a whispered charm prevents it from spilling over. He lays down his wand, picks up the blood pact and holds it over the cut. “ _Evanesco,_ ” he casts, and the container vanishes. The blood from inside falls into Dumbledore’s palm, where it mingles with the freshly spilt blood. “Would you care to join me?” Dumbledore says, gesturing to the tea one-handed.

He asks it in an offhand way but there are two teacups and saucers waiting, and Theseus gets the feeling Dumbledore really wants him to drink it too. “Yes, alright. But let me do that.” Theseus takes the pot and pours them a cup each.

“I’d add some sugar to yours,” Dumbledore suggests, a smile playing at the edge of his expression as always. “Don’t worry, the worst it will do without the rest of the ritual is promote good health.”

The tea tastes strange. Not unpleasant. It tastes a lot like you’d expect mixed kitchen herbs in hot water to taste. Theseus is not sitting comfortably. His heart keeps trying to climb up into his throat, which makes sipping tea difficult. What on earth could Dumbledore be intending to confess that nobody else has ever heard? He can’t believe that he’s been chosen to hear it, and he wants to perch on the edge of his seat and possibly bite his nails. He forces himself into a relaxed posture.

“My first confession is that I was at Nivelle,” Dumbledore says.

“At Nivelle? _The_ Nivelle? That was you?” Luckily, Theseus remembers his cup and saucer in time to prevent a spillage.

“I was trying to afford some good friends a moment of privacy, in a place where no privacy was possible. Nobody knows I was there. Except now you do.”

“What happened?”

“I was keeping watch, and then suddenly the French decided to mutiny. I had to do what I could. It was a still a death trap for most of the muggles.”

Theseus raises both eyebrows to convey that this is not nearly enough explanation. Events at Nivelle are one of the unsolved mysteries of the war. The wizards saved were questioned repeatedly but to no satisfaction. The Ministry have come to suspect that mysterious muggle technologies are to blame, but Theseus happens to know that the muggles can’t explain events either. Three hundred soldiers had disappeared from the field of battle, only to simultaneously re-appear four miles away, back in friendly territory. Some of them had been wizards who were able to apparate but the one consensus they had all come to was that apparition hadn’t been involved. The obvious alternative was some kind of powerful portkey but they had denied this possibility too. There had been none of the twisting sensation, or sickness that you would expect a portkeyed muggle to experience.

“I opened a portal,” Dumbledore explains. "Do you remember that we were looking for Drake’s telescope?"

“Merlin,” Theseus breathes, “You found it, didn’t you. Do they know you found it?”

“Some of them,” Dumbledore says, cryptically, and Theseus wonders who ‘some of them’ are, because they would need higher levels of clearance than Travers, or indeed Fawley himself. “They were all going to die. Many, many more did die.”

Theseus nods, eyes downcast, and they sip their tea in silent remembrance.

“When it was done my main concern was getting us out of there intact.”

“Of course. Another portal?” All of the wizards at Nivelle had been successfully evacuated, despite the enormous muggle body count. “You do know Evermonde’s eldest grandson was in that battle? You must have saved his life. Not to mention all the others.”

“But I couldn’t save the other muggles,” Dumbledore says sadly.

“Three hundred or so isn’t too shabby, it’s more than I ever managed.”

“Not the way I heard it,” Dumbledore says, and Theseus feels awkward at the praise. His own war heroics had involved a lot more teamwork for starters. “Dragging it all up now wouldn’t serve any purpose,” Dumbledore continues, “And it would mean betraying the whereabouts of the friends I was watching over to begin with. Besides, I might need to use the same trick again someday. Better to maintain the element of surprise, don’t you think?”

“You kept the telescope?” Theseus says, low voiced. He can hardly believe what he’s hearing.

Dumbledore sips his tea and pointedly doesn’t deny it.

Theseus shakes his head. “I might need more than tea if the rest of your confessions are going to continue in this vein.”

Dumbledore’s eyes crinkle, making him look like the harmless academic that he most definitely _isn’t_. He tops up their teacups. “While we’re on the subject of the muggle war,” he says, “There’s something else. My second confession. Did you ever hear the muggle stories of ghostly longbows and strange hazes of light? They thought they were seeing angels.”

Theseus shakes his head. “I don’t really speak to many muggles these days,” he says apologetically.

“Ah well.” Dumbledore nods. He stares into the fire and sips his tea. “When we first got involved, at Mons and Marne, you remember?” He waits for Theseus to nod. “We had some old muggle war uniforms and somebody, Diggory I think, thought it would help us blend in with their troops. Of course, they were hopelessly outdated. Bright red instead of khaki. We stuck out like sore thumbs. The muggles though… many were already delirious and sleep deprived. They believed they were seeing the ghosts of their bygone heroes; redcoats from great battles past come to their aid. I like to think it gave them strength.”

Theseus is glad of the cup and saucer and the ritual of tea drinking, otherwise his hands might shake. It brings it all back, the crack of guns, flashes and explosions. The bodies. The body _parts_. He shudders.

“Somebody who already has one foot in the world of the dead can be a ferocious ally,” Dumbledore says, looking at Theseus meaningfully, but if it’s a cryptic message then it’s lost on Theseus. “We led them out, over the top,” he explains quietly, and it’s all the explanation required.

Wizards had joined strategic muggle battles in the early days of the war, and those battles had usually been won, but at enormous cost of muggle life on both sides. The agony and slaughter of young muggle soldiers, mostly boys who had been Theseus’s own age, will stay with him until his dying day.

“Miskine and Diggory are dead,” Dumbledore says. “Miskine at Cambrai and Diggory only last year, after that tragic incident involving an enchanted mangle.”

Theseus winces. It had been a particularly messy accident according to Simmons, a healer friend of Newt’s.

“Nobody else knew about those old red uniforms, so now it’s just you and me.”

“It was terrible,” Theseus says, “The fighting at Mons. I wish we hadn’t.”

“Yes.”

The silence stretches for longer than before, and they stare into the fire and sip their tea.

Dumbledore sighs and places his empty cup on the tray. “What we did later though, at Verdun and Caporetto,” he says, “I believe our actions curtailed the fighting at Caporetto, possibly by years. And the dragons at the Romanian Front? That could have stretched out too if we hadn’t intervened.”

Theseus takes the small comfort for what it is and manages a shaky smile. “Good old Newt,” he agrees.

“It seems like only yesterday when he was my student,” Dumbledore muses. “I can’t tell you how strange the transition is, from student to professor. I was only twenty-eight when I returned to Hogwarts to teach. I already knew Euphraxia Mole well of course. She was a tower of strength when Arianna died. She believed in me so stubbornly that eventually I started to believe in myself. My eagerness to please her knew no bounds and became, I’m afraid, something of a problem.”

“What happened?”

Dumbledore looks embarrassed. “She was so helpful, always interested in my teaching ideas. I tentatively suggested we use some powdered Linfred’s Counteragent to teach the NEWT students about seeing past glamours, and she readily agreed. Suddenly the potions NEWTs were brewing it like it was going out of fashion, and we had enough left over to make a pair verisimilitude lenses. I still have them somewhere. You’ll remember that one of the main ingredients of Linfred’s Counteragent is powdered fairy wings? And I’m sure you know how expensive fairy wings are.”

Theseus nods. Everyone knows how expensive fairy wings are.

“I should have known something was off when she started bringing me muggle sweets. I’ve got a terribly sweet tooth, not that that’s any kind of secret.”

Theseus makes a mental note of it and wonders which type of muggle sweet are Dumbledore’s favourites. Then a horrible thought occurs to him. “She wasn’t, you know, sweet on _you_ , was she?”

“No! No, nothing like that.” He makes a revolted face and they both laugh at the ridiculous idea of their former headteacher making advances on anyone. “No, it was all my doing. Like a child oblivious to their wild magic, I was controlling her without meaning to. Most people accidentally break mirrors when they’re in a temper,” Dumbledore says. He looks unhappy. “I accidentally bewitched the headmistress to do my bidding. For a year.”

“You mean,” Theseus says slowly, “You accidentally _imperio_ ’d Mole?”

“Not _imperio_ ,” Dumbledore protests. “But yes. Professor Mole spent my first year of teaching under something not quite, but approximating to, the imperious curse.”

“What?! Merlin. That’s... that’s terrible,” Theseus says, grinning.

“Unintentionally,” Dumbledore reiterates. “People tell me I have a sort of natural charisma. I’ve practiced control since, of course, and made sure it couldn’t happen again. I was so worried at the time that someone would find out, but nobody ever did. I learned another lesson that year too: all the things I thought I had achieved in the usual way had been won through manipulation.”

Theseus makes a sound of protest but Dumbledore holds up a hand.

“It doesn’t matter that it was accidental. I have a talent for manipulation. You- you should probably be aware of it.” He looks studiously at his tea cup.

Theseus breathes. “It makes all the difference that it wasn’t intentional,” he says eventually.

“Perhaps.”

Dumbledore’s powers of persuasion aren’t exactly a new consideration for Theseus. Travers mistrusts Dumbledore because Travers couldn’t hope to be half the man Dumbledore is, and given the same powers and opportunities Travers _would_ be dangerous. And even Travers might be underestimating Dumbledore. Luckily for everyone, all Dumbledore seems to want to be is a great teacher. Dare Theseus hope for something more from Dumbledore on a personal level? It gives him the shivers to know that the man has both the power and guile to take whatever he wants. And yet Theseus can’t allow himself anything but blind faith in Dumbledore. It’s naïve and he knows it, but it’s still true.

“As a reprieve, confession number four isn’t something that I did, but rather something I should have done but didn’t.”

Theseus inclines his head, waiting,

“When I caught Professor Rondure taking fluxweed from the greenhouses by moonlight, I intended to ask him about it. When I realised he was also stealing lacewing flies and boomslang skin from the potions stores, I was trying to figure out a way to broach the subject when I caught him roaming the night-time corridors, polyjuiced to look like Professor Pyrel.”

“Oh Merlin. I don’t think I want to know this one,” Theseus says, feeling queasy. Professors Rondure and Pyrel had both taught him; Rondure had been a mild-mannered arithmancy professor, and Pyrel a fiery-haired, fiery-tempered transfigurations mistress.

“A burden shared is a burden halved they say,” Dumbledore says, faux-solemnly, mischievious for a moment before taking pity on him. “Don’t worry,” he adds, “It’s not what you think. I followed him, or her, depending on how you look at it. He apparated to London and met with Arsenius Jigger in Nocturn Alley.”

“The potioneer?”

“The same. He was cloaked and wore a glamour but his speech and mannerisms are quite unique.”

“That’s one way of putting it,” Theseus says, remembering the pompous affectations of Jigger. On the few occasions they’ve met Theseus has disliked the man more every time.

“Rondure bought a potion from Jigger, and I later found out that it was wolfsbane.”

Theseus whistles in amazement. “Are you telling me that Professor Rondure, dear old wouldn’t-hurt-a-fly Rondure, is a werewolf?”

Dumbledore nods sadly. “Was a werewolf,” he corrects. “Karl died last year. The funeral was wretchedly underattended. Once I had the clues it became obvious; unexplained injuries, howling in the forest, absences around the full moon, that kind of thing.”

In his first years at Hogwarts, as the oldest sibling a long way from home, Theseus had found Professor Karl Rondure comforting with his homely, bustling ways. He had liked the man. “Are you sure it was Jigger?” he asks. If it ever came to the fore that Arsenius Jigger, world renowned potioneer, had illegally supplied wolfsbane, and worse still to a _teacher_ , then the scandal would be enormous.

“It seems he had a soft spot for Samantha Pyrel.” Dumbledore looks troubled. “I followed him back to his shop that evening and saw him lift the glamour, so I’m sure it was him. I never did anything about it though. Karl was retiring that year anyway, and Samantha emigrated. She lives in Melbourne now, I believe.”

“And you’ve never told anyone but me,” Theseus finishes for him. He shakes his head in disbelief. “But surely this was Rondure’s secret, or Jigger’s. You weren’t involved, so how does it count as a confession?”

“My confession is that I never did anything about it, or even let on that I knew.” Dumbledore looks into the fire, eyes becoming unfocussed. “Somewhere on the other side of the world is a mother with a young family whose body was used, without her knowledge, to acquire an elicit potion. As far as I know, and to the very best of my reasoning, Karl Rondure never engaged in sexual relations with Arsenius Jigger in order to procure the potion.”

Theseus makes a gagging noise. “Please, spare me,” he moans.

Dumbledore shoots him a distracted half-smile but continues, “The difficulty is, I can’t be sure of it. I should get in touch with Samantha and tell her what happened; perhaps apologise for not telling her sooner, it would be the right thing to do, particularly now that Karl is gone.”

“But you’re not going to.”

There’s a pause before Dumbledore switches his full attention back to Theseus. “No,” he says, smiling a very _Dumbledore_ kind of a smile. “No, I’m not.”

Theseus shifts in his chair. “These are all very hefty secrets,” he says. “Not that I’m complaining, but surely there are smaller things, perhaps amusing childhood tales, that would suffice for the purposes of the ritual?” Theseus has his own secrets from school days. For example, there was the year when Newt had stopped growing completely and nobody had noticed. He’s ashamed of himself for it now but at the time it had seemed absolutely crucial that his little brother didn’t outgrow him by too much. Sometimes he wonders how tall Newt might have grown without his interference. Instead, he’s more or less of a height with Theseus, perhaps a shade taller. Newt probably wouldn’t have wanted to be too tall anyway. It’s what he tells himself.

“They have to be secrets never before told,” Dumbledore says gently. “I told everything to him, you see. Everything.”

“Oh. I see,” Theseus says, feeling foolish. Surely Dumbledore couldn’t have told Grindelwald _everything_. He himself hadn’t told Leta everything, and they had been very close. It wasn’t that he’d held things back from her, but to tell a person everything you would have to set out specifically to do just that. He’s been trying not to think about Dumbledore’s relationship with Grindelwald, and this hint at its intensity is something Theseus both does and doesn’t want to think about. It makes him feel hot and bothered.

“There was something that happened to me ten years ago though,” Dumbledore says, bringing him out of his reverie. “It was summer and I was in Wales visiting Elphias. Do you know of the black oak in Carmarthen?”

“Merlin’s oak?”

“I met a man, right there by the oak. A young man, younger than I was, even back then. He was just standing there smoking a cigarette and he called me over, by name. There was nothing outwardly remarkable about him and in fact, he looked a lot like what muggles would call ‘an undesirable.’ When he spoke to me though, I don’t know how to describe it. I could hear the rush of a thousand years in his voice, or perhaps it was the flight of a hundred dragons.”

“Are you trying to tell me that you met…”

“His eyes were gold,” Dumbledore says. “He was not entirely of this world, whoever he was.”

“What did he say to you?” Theseus prompts, because Dumbledore has fallen silent.

“He talked about love. Not the familial love that most people think of when you say the word, but about the power of wild love in the context of wild magic. He said it wouldn’t be tamed but that it could be channelled, and that I could be a conduit of sorts, if I chose to be. I thought at the time he was speaking of my relationship with Grindelwald, justifying it as a meeting of light and dark. Now I’m not so sure.”

“Is it even possible?” Theseus says, still stuck on the wizard himself and filing away the part about Grindelwald for later consideration. “He’s what? An eternally youthful loafer living in Southern Wales?”

Dumbledore huffs in amusement. “Who knows. He variously ages backwards, not at all or in a dimension where such things don’t work in the same way, depending on what you’re reading. I liked him though. I think you would have liked him too. He knew things about me, things about my past, but instead of judging me for it he seemed to understand. Which brings me to Grindelwald.”

Theseus swallows and concentrates on regulating his breathing. If Travers knew that Theseus was about to hear Dumbledore’s confessions regarding Gellert Grindelwald then he’d either cream himself or spontaneously combust in a fit of jealousy.

“We only have two confessions left,” Dumbledore says, holding their eye contact, “But I have to ask if you want to stop.  We can stop now and I could find another way. There’s always another way if the time and effort is made.”

“No,” Theseus says, “That is, don’t stop.” He has to look away from Dumbledore. “I want to know,” he admits quietly, feeling the weight of the words as they’re spoken: he wants to know everything about Albus Dumbledore, whatever the cost.

“Alright.” Dumbledore shares out the last of the tea and takes a sip. “This quest of Grindelwald’s is not the first thing to come between us. We had our ethical differences of course, but then the war came between us too. Authorities on both sides explicitly banned wizarding participation, and of course both of us ignored the ban. I heard stories of his involvement, we all did, but I met him once and only once on the field of battle in nineteen eighteen, when it was almost over.

“The USS Cyclops disappeared on the fourth of March in the Bermuda Triangle. It had been carrying manganese to make munitions. What actually happened was that Grindelwald was trying to intercept the cargo and I stopped him. As a result, the ship went down. I couldn’t save the muggle crew. I tried, I looked for ages. There are always wreck survivors from a ship that big, always, but that time there weren’t. I sent the wreck to the depths of the ocean in a temper and banished the manganese. This isn’t my confession, this is a matter of semi-public record, under lock and key in the Ministry’s War Records. I’m trying to put in context for you the last time I met him. Don’t get me wrong, I see him all the time, in print, in my dreams, and sometimes in visions, which can also be meetings of a sort.”

“Have you spoken with him, in the dreams and visions?”

Dumbledore nods, and this time it’s not Theseus who avoids making eye contact. “I’m afraid so. Sometimes more.”

“I see.”

“He has brilliant ideas,” Dumbledore says, “The Knowledge and patience, even the wisdom, almost everything he needs to be a great leader. All of these qualities are corrupted by one infuriating and all-encompassing flaw. Do you know what it is?”

“He doesn’t know love?” Theseus asks, almost hopefully.

Dumbledore looks pityingly at him and shakes his head, “No, that’s not it.”

"He doesn’t value life, then,” Theseus says, feeling more confident about this assertation, because surely Grindelwald has demonstrated as much by now.

“Sort of. He values life but he doesn’t cling to it. He doesn’t value life over all other things, and it’s what sets him apart from most of the rest of us. For a long time I believed it was a strength. He’s a seer, you know. Let’s say he always has an eye on the other side and absolute faith in an afterlife.”

“His eye?” Theseus frowns. “We thought that was the result of an accident.”

“An accident of a kind,” Dumbledore allows, but apparently that’s not one of the secrets being revealed today. “I think he’s right, incidentally, about the afterlife, and about the weakness in most of us where we fear death. Grindelwald sees death as a very thin line, and a temporary parting only. Not even that, for he wields the power to speak with departed loved ones if he so chooses.”

“Necromancer,” Theseus whispers, an accusation and a curse.

“Yes. This is what I struggled with; still struggle with if I’m honest. Because isn’t he right, on some level? Should we not all live as though every day was our last?”

Theseus’s mind goes to Leta. The idea that she is reachable in some other dimension, perhaps even watching over this very conversation, seems ludicrous. His face must betray his scepticism.

“Perhaps you’re right.” Dumbledore swigs the last of his tea in an ungentlemanly gulp. “I have a mirror, it’s called the Mirror of Erised. How I came to have it is a story for another time but it has a powerful magic about it. In short, the Mirror of Erised shows you your heart’s desire. Many a soul has wasted away before it, in perpetual yearning.”

“It’s him you see in the mirror,” Theseus says. It’s not a question. “Still?”

Dumbledore nods. “I wanted you to know this, confessions and rituals aside. At first I see us making this pact, then I just see him, how he is now, with all his faults.”

It hurts. Theseus wants to believe that if he himself looked in this enchanted mirror he would see Leta, fully restored to life and health. He knows though, in his heart of hearts, that it’s no longer true.

Dumbledore seems exhausted. He stares into the fire. “I’m half-way sure I’ll kill him,” he says, softly, “Half-way sure I hate him and almost certain I wish we’d never met.”

The minutes tick by and Theseus finishes his own tea more delicately. Eventually, he feels that he has to bring it up. “That’s only six,” he says.

Dumbledore smiles ruefully and draws their chairs alarmingly close together. He lays his cut hand in Theseus’s hands, bloodied palm up. The touch is electric. A small, embarrassing noise escapes Theseus and he has trouble breathing. Dumbledore looks into his eyes and says, “Last term I knitted fifteen pairs of socks.”

“You-”

“Professor Merrythought taught me to knit over the Christmas holidays two years ago, during that particularly cold winter we had. Once I get going I have trouble stopping. It’s soothing, you should try it. But I, um, haven’t admitted it to anyone else yet, in case they laugh.”

Theseus laughs, relief shuddering through him like cool water.

“Look.” Dumbledore nods to his hand, still cradled in Theseus’s. The wound across his palm is closing, leaving a lone droplet of blood sitting in its place. “Pass me the phiall?”

“Is that it?” Theseus holds out the phiall and Dumbledore silently coaxes the droplet into it, stoppering the top and tucking it into his waistcoat pocket.

“It only remains to break the magical bond,” Dumbledore confirms. “Not too painful, this part, I hope?”

“Not at all,” Theseus agrees. “Or, not for me at least. Can I ask you something else?”

“Because I haven’t talked enough?” Dumbledore shoots him a grin.

“One more question.”

Dumbledore tilts his head in a _depends-what-the-question-is_ gesture.

“What were you trying to animate with the book, before all this, when you first came across the potion?”

Dumbledore laughs. “Yes, alright. A pair of gloves.”

“Your gloves! What gave you the idea?”

“You said one more question.”

Theseus narrows his eyes but leaves it alone. He turns down Dumbledore’s offer of dinner at the staff table in the Great Hall, promising to take him up on it next time. He feels like a child posing as an adult and wonders if Dumbledore had felt this way returning to teach, and how long it had taken for the feeling to pass.

Dumbledore sees him out, accompanying him all the way to the main gates. “It should be possible to break the binding spell, now that the blood has been separated,” he says, leaning against the ivy-bound iron gates, one hand in his trouser pocket. He looks like a book cover for one of those flowery romance novels. “I’m afraid the hard part will be the research.”

“I can help,” Theseus says, immediately self-conscious that he sounds over-eager.

“I’ve asked so much of you already.” Dumbledore’s eyes crinkle in an unguarded smile.

“I suppose it’s like a muggle divorce,” Theseus’s mouth says, without permission from his brain because he can’t bear the naked affection in Dumbledore’s expression for long and has to say something. “Maybe if you found similar grounds, you could nullify the binding or something.”

Dumbledore nods, looking thoughtful. “You may well be right,” he says, and Theseus can’t tell if it’s the truth or he’s just being humoured.

 

****

 

Theseus wakes in the wee small hours of the morning from a nightmare about the war. He has been flailing his arms in his sleep, trying to disperse clouds of yellow death. Dream soldiers follow him into the quiet of his bedroom, their skin blistering and their faces melting, transforming from handsome youths into the horrific masks that survivors of mustard gas are doomed to wear forevermore, like walking inferi.

The ghosts fade with the dream but Theseus can’t get back to sleep. His wandering mind takes him through the events of the day, and inevitably to Dumbledore himself.

Dumbledore had been at Nivelle and Mons, and goodness knew how many other battles, and so perhaps Dumbledore dreams of the same horrors that Theseus does. He wonders whether it leaves Dumbledore feeling this way too: with a desperate urgency to live and experience everything _now-now-now_ before it’s too late. In the cradle of the night, it seems foolish that he hasn’t yet made the first move with Dumbledore.

He thinks about their closeness beneath the umbrella. The conversation by the fireside had been intimate and Theseus could easily have taken matters into his own hands once the ritual was complete. He could have kissed that ever-present amusement from Dumbledore’s lips, got down on his knees and… He’s sure Dumbledore would have allowed it, welcomed it even. He wonders what Dumbledore’s doing right now, whether he’s sleeping or awake. He could be awake and thinking the very same thoughts. He thinks of Dumbledore saying ‘ _Should we not all live as though every day was our last?’_ and comes with a muffled groan, slipping back into sleep with the lingering hollowness of yearning for company.

 


	3. Chapter 3

 

 

Dumbledore winks at Theseus from the other end of the long boardroom table, and Theseus sends back a small smile, hoping that Travers isn’t paying attention. His Monday morning diary had been scrubbed at the last moment for an ‘emergency meeting’, and Dumbledore’s presence means it can only concern Grindelwald.

Finkfoot stands up and clears his throat, and the other thirty or so delegates fall silent. “Yesterday there were two events,” he says, “Both significant in our pursuit of Gellert Grindelwald.” Edward Finkfoot’s voice is the Ministry’s best call to attention, the equivalent of an ancient hunting horn; bell-clear with a hint of Northumberland accent. Finkfoot looks to Fawley, seated to his left. Fawley gives a small nod and Finkfoot continues, “The bad news first then. Last night an attack on the Binky family of Upper Tadpole, Gloucestershire left three of four Binky family members dead.”

A murmur ripples along the table and Theseus’s throat constricts. He had known Jemima Binky at school, a rival beater on the Gryffindor team in their fourth and fifth years with an endearing speech impediment and a wicked sense of humour.

“Mrs Binky and Mrs Binky Senior were both killed,” Finkfoot continues, dashing Theseus’s hopes, “Murdered, we believe, by Gellert Grindelwald. As was Eloise Binky, aged eight. The sole survivor was Roland Binky, aged three years. He is being cared for by cousins from the McNally family. Circumstances suggest that he was intentionally spared and is therefore at no further risk.”

Dead then. Poor Jemima, murdered in her own home with her mother and daughter. At least one of her children has survived though. Theseus presses his lips together to prevent anything embarrassing happening, like a wobble, in present company.

“It seems the motivating factor was the theft of Mrs Alberta Binky’s infamous Méras tarot deck, which has been confirmed missing.” Finkfoot gestures for one of the Ministry house elves stationed against the wall to come forward.

The elf levitates a large gold-framed portrait down from the wall, to the end of the table where old Stuffpot has to shuffle sideways to make room. The nervous looking portrait witch holds out a deck of red-backed cards for all to inspect. They look like any other tarot deck to Theseus’s untrained eye. Finkfoot inclines his head, smiling his thanks to the witch, who bobs a curtsey and bustles back to her card table while the elf re-hangs the portrait.

“Nora Binky,” Finkfoot explains, “Seventeenth century. As you all know, Grindelwald is a seer, and the Méras deck is purported to give nuance and inflection to any given prophecy. Indeed, Mrs Alberta Binky acted as a consultant to the Ministry for years, and would have been known personally by many of you here. I myself was very fond of her and she will be sorely missed.”

Dumbledore’s face is set in a frown, eyes cast down. Theseus wonders how well he had known the Binkys and how it feels to have a mass murdering ex-boyfriend.

“It is possible that the two Binky women died because they refused to instruct Grindelwald on the use of the cards, but this doesn’t explain the death of the child.” Finkfoot turns to address Theseus’s end of the table, where Travers and his team are assembled. “Whether the murders were pre-medicated or merely an accident of the robbery is not yet clear, and Magical Law Enforcement will be investigating.”

Another elf steps forward and levitates a scroll to Travers, who half-stands to accept it. A grim nod at Fawley leaves no doubt about what either man is thinking: _we’ll get the bastard_ , or some variation thereof. The purple wax of the scroll’s seal means ‘top secret’.

“Dumbledore, I understand you have better news for us,” Finkfoot invites, retaking his seat at Fawley’s right-hand as Dumbledore stands to address the room.

“Good morning,” Dumbledore says, and Theseus can’t help thinking that his mild manner might be perceived as infuriating under the circumstances; fuel for Dumbledore’s detractors. “Yesterday evening I had considerable success with the task set me by the founding members of this committee last week. With the help of Mr Scamander,” he nods his head in Theseus’s direction and their eyes catch for a fraction of a second, “And thanks to the generous loan of the Achaemenid Codex,” he nods, deeper this time, to Fawley, “I have unravelled the blood pact binding me to Gellert Grindelwald.”

Murmuring breaks out again and Stuffpot guffaws. The old man gets to his feet, hobbles to Dumbldore’s side and claps him on the back. “Well done, my boy!” he shouts, loud enough to be heard in the Department of Mysteries, still liking to hear his own voice despite being profoundly deaf.

“And well done you,” Stebbins whispers, elbowing Theseus in the ribs.

Theseus wants to grin but that would just be gauche. He allows himself a single eyebrow tilt instead. He and Stebbins are two of only four members of Travers’ auror team invited to this committee, and certainly the most junior delegates present. Dumbledore may not be trusted by everyone here but he is certainly respected, and his recommendation means a lot.

Fawley clears his throat, “When you say ‘unravelled’…?”

“I mean broken,” Dumbledore says, and it’s like a punch to Theseus’s gut. “The blood pact between myself and Gellert Grindelwald no longer exists.”

Dumbledore must have broken the magical bond last night, Theseus realises, after he himself had left. He had probably been waiting for Theseus to leave, intending to be alone for the final part all along. Theseus feels foolish and betrayed, and then instantly angry with himself for feeling that way. He tries to shake it off. Dumbledore had even credited him with helping, which is really more credit than he deserves for drinking tea and lending an ear. How had Dumbledore broken the binding anyway?

The same question must be on the minds of the other delegates because Morgan Clancy leans forward and taps his knuckles on the table. “What we all need to know,” he drawls, “Is _how_ you did it. Those bindings are _supposed_ to be unbreakable.”

“Ah, well.” Dumbledore smiles. “A cleansing ritual to separate the blood followed by an idea that Mr Scamander came up with actually.”

This is news to Theseus. He raises both eyebrows, otherwise poker-faced, as the room turns to regard him speculatively.

“Grounds for dissolving muggle pacts are rather restrictive in Britain,” Dumbledore continues, “But if you look to our cousins in the New World, particularly the West Coast, then ideas are more… liberal. Pacts can be dissolved if one party is prone to ‘habitual intemperance’, for example. If one considers the bindings to be sentient ropes or chains and considers me to be a sort of solicitor, arguing a case for the annulment of the bond-”

“I’m almost sorry I asked,” Clancy mutters, to general good-natured amusement.

Dumbledore flashes him a smile. “I would have made an excellent muggle solicitor I think. I was able to partially persuade the spell that I was no longer the same person- the same soul, if you will -who had made the pact. For the purposes of the bond I effectively declared myself… not insane precisely, but irreversibly changed.”

“And it just let you go?” Fawley says. “Your reputation for influence precedes you Dumbledore, but surely nobody can undo such a powerful binding with mere _ideas_.”

“No indeed,” Dumbledore nods, “But it relaxed the bindings somewhat. The rest of it… well. How would you break magical bindings in any other circumstance?” He looks around the room for answers.

“For Merlin’s sake man,” Clancy complains, “We’re not at school you know.”

“With _confringo_?” Stebbins suggests.

“Yes,” Dumbledore says, nodding enthusiastically, “Or _diffindo_ , or _bombarda_ : the spell itself isn’t the important part. The point is that it came down to brute force in the final stage. Which is to say, it required a great deal of effort but now it’s done.”

There’s a studious silence and Theseus wonders if every other man in the room feels the same uneasy quail of his innards when imagining Dumbledore’s magical ‘brute force’ unleashed. None of them show it.

“And the blood?” Travers says. “Grindelwald’s blood could be extremely useful.”

“Sadly, both samples of blood, his and mine, were utterly annihilated in the breaking of the bond.”

Theseus studies the other faces at the table surreptitiously, from Stuffpot to Clancy, from Finkfoot to Fawley; colleagues many years his senior whom he admires, and it dawns on him that he is the only one who knows that Dumbledore is lying.

The meeting ends with Finkfoot announcing that the Monday morning fixture is to become a regular one, and that their committee is codenamed ‘The Board Assigned to Intermutual Teamwork’, or B.A.I.T. If questioned, they are to say that the group has been established to promote interdepartmental cooperation, a topic guaranteed to bore even the most enthusiastic young bureaucrat to tears.

“I have to be back at Hogwarts this afternoon,” Dumbledore says, by way of greeting, as the others file out of the meeting room to their various departments and levels.

“Haven’t the Christmas holidays started yet?” Theseus does his best to hide the hurt that he hasn’t been able to shake since Dumbledore’s surprise announcement. “Pity about the blood,” he adds, sotto voce, once he’s sure the others are out of earshot.

“It’s the last week of term,” Dumbledore says cheerfully, but his eyes say _clever boy_. “But if you’re around this evening, I could meet you at The Shining Stag. Say sixish?”

“So you’ve developed a taste for muggle beer after all.”  

“Not the beer.” Dumbledore watches him patiently, always kind and always, somehow, asking for so much.

Theseus swallows and the gutted feeling begins to subside. “Yes, alright,” he says, tentatively returning the smile, “I’ll be there.”

 

****

 

The Shining Stag is much quieter on a Monday evening. Theseus watches dispassionately as the drunk muggle at the corner table rouses himself and experiences a revelation: that it would be better to sleep it off at home, in his own bed, and possibly not to drink so much in the future.

“Perhaps the darker beers taste better,” Dumbledore suggests, setting their drinks on the vacated corner table and hanging back politely to let Theseus choose which stool he would prefer.

Theseus takes the still-warm muggle’s seat and eyes the dark, almost black, pints with mistrust. They do look inviting with their velvety foam layers, but the drinks last time had looked a lot like butterbeer and he’s not going to be so easily fooled twice.

“To absent friends and second chances?” Dumbledore toasts.

“Absent friends and second chances.” They knock glasses and take a sip. For a moment neither of them speak, until Theseus forces himself to swallow and whispers, “Is it a joke?” Most of the muggles around them are drinking the amber-coloured beer from last time but there _are_ muggle men drinking the same disgusting dark bitter, he can _see_ them. “How are they doing it?”

“Another mystery of the muggle world.” Dumbledore grimaces. “I could…?” He wiggles his fingers to indicate the liquid of his own drink, which bubbles as though it has been shaken. When the bubbles settle the liquid has changed colour, black to amber.

“Yes please.”

Theseus’s drink changes too, with no finger wiggling this time. He takes a sip and scowls. “You couldn’t have managed butterbeer?”

Dumbledore shrugs. “When in Rome,” he says, sipping his own drink to hide his smile.

It turns out that Jemima Binky had been one person Dumbledore had not known, although he has a number of entertaining stories about her mother. They trade memories and somehow one drink becomes two, becomes three, and Theseus realises that he is forever going to associate the taste of muggle beer with Albus Dumbledore. The thought makes him shiver.

Their conversation lulls, but the silence between them is a comfortable one, filled by background chatter and the crackle of the fireplace at Dumbledore’s back. “You know, it wasn’t as easy as I made out, breaking the pact,” Dumbledore ventures.

“It didn’t sound at all easy to me.” The feelings of betrayal at not having been invited to help resurge, and Theseus fights them down.

Dumbledore laces his fingers and stretches his palms, staring into them as though they might tell him something. “Magically it was quite a feat, if I do say so myself. But that’s not what I mean.”

Theseus’s fingers want to lace themselves together in imitation of Dumbledore’s but he holds himself still. His breathing feels wrong, too quick and shallow. “You mean, it was difficult… emotionally?” The word hangs between them, _verboten_ : one did not go around talking about one’s feelings willy-nilly.

Dumbledore sighs. “Soul wrenching,” he admits, looking up. His eyes are wide, begging for understanding.

“You should have let me stay!” Theseus blurts. There’s alcohol like warm treacle in his veins, and he’s sure his face is red. He had wanted to be there for Dumbledore, to be a part of it, to be important to him. “I wanted to help,” he says, and it sounds pathetic to his own ears.

Dumbledore looks so …soft, adoring. It might be pity. Theseus can’t handle it.

“I’m sorry,” he says, gripping the table edge for something to do with his hands and shaking his head because actually, no, he’s not sorry. “It’s just, I thought… I do have some magical power you know. I might actually have been able to help. It needn’t have been so… so…” _lonely_ , he thinks. “Sorry,” his face feels so hot. “It’s not my business.” Merlin but he’s making a fool of himself. “Sorry.” What the hell is wrong with him? He had been like this after Leta’s death but thought he was getting better. Clearly, he had been mistaken.

“Theseus,” Dumbledore reaches out and they both startle when he touches Theseus’s hand.

Dumbledore pulls his hand away and Theseus glances around but nobody is looking their way.

“I should have asked you to stay. It is your business; I made it your business.” Distress makes hollows of Dumbledore’s cheeks, where usually there’s a myriad of smile-lines, and Theseus hates himself a little for causing it. “It was… unpleasant but I would have been glad of your company afterwards.”

“Why didn’t you?” Theseus’s demands, his mouth still running away with him.

Dumbledore doesn’t answer but he doesn’t break eye contact either. His eyes seem darker in the dimly lit pub, pupils wide; no trace of the usual play of hazel and green.

Theseus’s lips part without his permission but he stares back, refusing to back down.

“I know it’s late,” Dumbledore says carefully, “But would you consider keeping me company this evening?”

 _Yes!_ Merlin, _yes_. “I might.” Theseus can’t keep the smile from his face. It feels like all his cares are falling away.

Dumbledore’s face bristles into a grin and there’s a wicked gleam in his eye. “Then we should get out of here.”

Theseus follows him into the street and around the side of the Shining Stag into the darkness. Dumbledore’s arms go around him but before he can reciprocate there’s the wrench and spin of side-along apparition and they’re stumbling apart in a homely looking bedroom, with a rocking chair by the fireplace and a patchwork quilt on the bed. “But you can’t apparate into Hogwarts,” Theseus says with a frown, trying to get his bearings.

“Mmm,” Dumbledore agrees, eyes crinkling with silent laughter as he takes Theseus’s face in his hands and kisses him.

Theseus kisses back, chasing the challenge. He wants to wipe the amusement off Dumbledore’s face and replace it with the hunger that he has been feeling for weeks. They go stumbling backwards onto the bed and Dumbledore looks up at him, nostrils flaring delicately. Theseus notes with satisfaction that his smile has softened into awe.

“I want to-” he fumbles the buttons of Dumbledore’s waistcoat and shirt, and Dumbledore helps, rolling them, biting kisses and touches as they shed their clothes that promise more of the same.

Finally, naked as the day they were born, they tumble together with abandon, skin on skin. It’s a playful battle for dominance and Theseus can’t get enough; there’s so much _skin_. He might be harder than he’s ever been, so turned on, and he just wants to keep Dumbledore close, rolling, rubbing and rutting together until they’re both irrevocably lost. Dumbledore keeps pushing him back into the mattress though, and trying to kiss his way down Theseus’s torso. “Let me,” he insists, “Just let me.”

Theseus caves with a moan, his hands taking fistfuls of quilt, and he grits his teeth against the fresh assault of bliss. It’s overwhelming, the warmth and wetness, the slide of Dumbledore’s mouth. _Dumbledore’s mouth_. There’s the faintest scratch of beard against his thigh as Dumbledore shifts, taking him deeper, and Theseus comes helplessly undone, losing himself, ruined forever in the sweet nihilation of Dumbledore’s mouth, his body jerking as he groans out his pleasure.

“I can-” Theseus tries to manoeuvre them, once he comes back to himself, to switch positions and return the favour, but Dumbledore refuses, shaking his head. When they kiss his mouth tastes of Theseus’s come.

“I’m so close,” Dumbledore murmurs, guiding Theseus’s hand to his cock. He cups his own hand over Theseus’s and Theseus brings him off, their bodies pressed together as Dumbledore spills himself, shuddering, over Theseus’s belly and thigh.  

Theseus holds him afterwards, Dumbledore half-blanketing him. There’s a small replica of the Prague Alchemists’ Clock on the mantlepiece and they listen to its clockwork whirring softly.

“Dumbledore-”

“Albus,” Dumbledore says gently. “Call me Albus.”

Theseus swallows thickly. “Albus. What you said about Grindelwald not fearing death… is it the same for you?”

Dumbledore lifts his head to look Theseus in each eye. Apparently reassured by whatever he finds there, he whispers a kiss against Theseus’s skin and lays his head back down. “Not the same, no,” he says.

“It’s just, ever since Leta’s death… It’s irrational to fear death so much, I know. I just keep imagining losing Newt, or…”

Dumbledore tries to hook the rumpled quilt with his foot, snorting in frustration when he fails. Instead, he holds out a hand, waiting for the quilt to snake up on its own, before catching it and pulling it over them both. It’s comforting. He breathes a sigh of content and strokes the edge of his thumb along Theseus’s jaw contemplatively. “That those we love will die is what makes us human. We experience life through our fear of death. Everyone does.”

“But not Grindelwald.”

“No. But perversely, this is what makes him a monster. He was always a monster, I think.”

 _And yet you still love him_ , Theseus thinks. He would never be so crass as to say it aloud though, and besides, what would be the point? Dumbledore- _Albus_ -would be hurt and he would either lie or avoid the issue to save Theseus’s feelings. He pulls Dumbledore close instead, and he goes easily enough, entangling their limbs and pressing his body into the embrace. His breath tickles Theseus’s chest where it stirs against the hair.

The minutes whir by and Theseus starts to feel sleepy. “Maybe I am too,” Dumbledore says, barely more than a whisper. “I try not to be.”

Theseus holds him fiercely tight. He’s going to guard this new-found joy, he decides. He’s going to shelter them both from the world.

 

****

 

Hogwarts Castle is stirring with signs of early life as they sneak across the grounds in the morning. They have left it so late that the faintest hints of winter dawn threaten in the eastern sky.

Theseus feels like a teenaged delinquent, creeping around the school grounds and doing his best to stay hidden. Dumbledore seems to find the whole thing terribly amusing.

“Don’t worry,” he says for the umpteenth time, “Nobody knows you’re here.”

Despite his best disillusionment charm, Theseus feels vulnerable to the eyes of the castle. He can’t quite get over the childhood suspicion that teachers have eyes in the backs of their heads. “If you apparated me in, can’t you apparate me out too?”

Dumbledore’s eyes dance. “I don’t know what you mean. Apparition is impossible in the grounds of Hogwarts.”

Theseus narrows his eyes. “You could,” he accuses. “You’re just enjoying watching me do the walk of shame.”

“My dear Theseus, I enjoy watching you do any kind of walk.”

It’s the final straw. They’re at the gates anyway, so Theseus grabs Dumbledore by the wrist and pulls him through them, and underneath a convenient rhododendron bush, where he can kiss away that teasing smirk to his satisfaction.

Dumbledore goes easily, laughing softly. Their bodies melt into one another, so naturally that they might have known how for years.

 

****

 

Grindelwald apparates silently into the shadows of a pine tree just outside the Hogwarts school gates, and watches the men embrace. He had felt the bond break a day ago, and has been tracking Albus’s movements ever since. Unfortunately, Hogwarts and the Ministry of Magic are off limits without alerting both Albus and the authorities to his interest, and he had been unable to find Albus the evening before, cloaked in shadow and disappearing into muggle London.

Albus has his guard down now though, with this new boy-toy apparently, which explains a lot. Grindelwald makes a quiet _pfft_ noise of irritation and amusement both. It is just like Albus to put a spanner in the works for nothing more than his latest squeeze. He had worried that it might signify a plot for his own immediate capture, or even death, but sees now that it is nothing of the sort. Or at least, not yet.

The boy is pleasing enough in a wholesome way. He is tall and conventionally handsome, like a guardsman perhaps. The attentions he is lavishing on Albus are over-eager and almost frantically possessive, which makes him all the more entertaining to Grindelwald’s eye.

Albus is harder to look at, obviously swept up in the whirlwind of this new romance. His joy draws Grindelwald in like a magnet, always so potent at close range.

Grindelwald shakes his head and melts back into the shadows. He will monitor the situation; consider it further at his leisure, but for now there are other matters of greater importance demanding his attention.

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

 

The front door of Newt’s house in Finchley admits Theseus before he can even knock. “Newt?” he calls, making his way to the staircase at the back, that leads down to the cellars.

“Down here,” a faint voice confirms, muffled by the floors separating them. “Just hiding this new occamy clutch from the nifflers. Come on down.”

Theseus passes Bunty on the stairs. She’s flushed but looks happy enough, with a strangely textured blue-grey stain on her apron. Theseus’s instincts keep him from looking at it too closely. She smiles timidly and he returns it in a way that he hopes is mature and encouraging. “Looking for my brother, Bunty,” he says. “How’s the kelpie?”

“Newt’s in the subtropical menagerie with the new clutch of occamy eggs,” Bunty says. “I was just leaving for the day. Oh, and Nestor’s fine thanks, Mr Scamander.” At Theseus’s blank looks she clarifies, “Nestor’s the kelpie.”

“It’s Theseus, please,” he says. “Anything I need to watch out for? Aside from Nestor, I mean. Obviously.”

Bunty gestures to the mess on her apron. “I’d steer clear of the mooncalves for now if I were you, Theseus.” She gives him a shy smile. “They seem to have contracted an unfortunate virus.”

“I’ll do that.” Theseus winks at her without really meaning to and descends the remaining stairs wondering when exactly he turned into the kind of man who _winks_ at young women and whether spending time with Dumbledore is having adverse effects. Hopefully it’s something he can nip in the bud, since he doesn’t want to turn into Cecil Stuffpot before he’s even forty years old.  

Newt’s herd of mooncalves are slumped in a miserable pile of grey fur and giant sad eyes. “They’ll be okay,” Newt reassures him, when he asks. “Bunty dosed them with herbaria before she left. These eggs on the other hand, are definitely going to get stolen if I can’t find a better hiding place.”

The nifflers are into everything, from the spun silver threads of the billywig bedding to the glossy discarded nundus spikes. After consideration, they decide to create a small cave in the broadleaf forest zone. According to Newt, nifflers are unlikely to venture into the forest because of all the shadows cast by the trees; excellent hiding places for niffler predators in the wild. Privately, Theseus thinks the nifflers have rather too much freedom but he knows better than to suggest it to Newt. It feels good, using his magic to create, after all the things he’s banished recently. Newt relays news of the other creatures as they work, and Theseus feels loose and at ease.

They’re placing the occamy nest tenderly amongst a bed of acanthus leaves when Newt quirks a smile and mutters, “Don’t look now, but we have an audience.” Apparently, the demiguise that’s watching them, almost completely invisible where it’s blended against a tree trunk, is the same one that had played nanny to the giant occamy chick in New York. Newt is much happier about the clutch’s safety with the addition of its new bodyguard.

They’re just emerging from the cellars when Newt’s front door admits someone else. “Do your wards need work?” Theseus asks incredulously. “Do they just admit anyone these days?”

“It’s only Tina.” Newt goes to greet her, not meeting Theseus’s eye. It seems Tina and Newt have grown closer then Theseus had realised, presumably thanks to his own preoccupation with Dumbledore. He’s happy for them.

Newt takes her coat, which isn’t an embrace, and a look passes between them that isn’t actually a kiss but might as well be. “Oh. Hello Theseus,” Tina says, a little flustered when she finally notices him. “How are you getting along with Stilt and Frisby?”

“Stilt and-?”

Someone thunders, “Scamander!” from outside, and starts banging on the door. “Open up!”

To Newt’s credit the wards don’t automatically admit Morgan Clancy, and the subsequent pounding speaks of a man who is little-used to being denied entry anywhere.

Theseus shares a look with his brother and Newt shrugs. “It’ll be for you anyway,” he says, so it’s Theseus who opens the door.

“The Ministry’s under attack,” Clancy announces. “You need to come in. Why the hell aren’t you at home? Never mind.” He looks over Theseus’s shoulder at Newt. “Scamander the Younger,” he says, by way of greeting. “Do you still have that swooping evil?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good. In that case you’d better come too. Not the woman though.”

Newt says, “ _The woman_ has a name. Tina, this is Lord Clancy, Unspeakable. Lord Clancy, this is Officer Goldstein with MACUSA.”

Clancy rolls his eyes. “Wonderful. And where is Dumbledore?” he demands, glaring at Theseus.

“ _I_ don’t know,” Theseus says, inducing a narrow look from Clancy. Could he know somehow? How could he know? Theseus tries to look innocent, aware that both Clancy and Tina are regarding him with interest. “Have you tried Hogwarts?”

Clancy sniffs, supremely unimpressed, so no change there. “Get a move on would you,” he says, and disapparates.

 

****

 

“He’s after the war records!” Jossie Afovey hisses from across the hall, where she’s sheltering behind a pillar.

Theseus presses back against his own pillar. Curses tear through the air around them. The killing curse erupts, fortunately without finding a target, in an unmistakable sickly-green flash. “Grindelwald?” Theseus whispers back, as loud as he can without using his actual speaking voice.

“He’s here,” Afovey confirms, indicating the barrage of office furniture that’s blocking the stairwell with a jerk of her head. “And six others. We think they’re after the war records. Watch out!”

Theseus pulls his head back in, in time to dodge a _stupefy_ , fired from behind the barricade. The stairwell leads down to a dead-end repository where only the war records are held, so it’s a fair assumption. Security in the Ministry has been recently upgraded, mostly due to the risk of just such an attack by Grindelwald, and Theseus remembers Afovey herself boasting that the new measures were second only to Gringotts’. Grindelwald is notoriously shrewd though, and the new measures depend, in part, on the Ministry’s existing anti-apparition wards. They’re similar to the ones that protect Hogwarts and Theseus has new reasons to doubt they will hold Dumbledore’s nemesis.

He scans the balcony and directs Afovey’s attention overhead. “From up there?” he suggests.

She makes a _maybe_ gesture with her hand but nods in the direction the statue at the top of the stairs instead. The statue is of a portly witch with a sour expression, a little larger than life-size. Theseus has no idea who she was or what she did, and she doesn’t look like she enjoyed it anyway. “Secret door to the ladies powder room,” Afovey whispers, with a smirk. “For emergency use only.”

Theseus grins and uses the hand-signal that means _I’ll cover you_. He sends a barrage of flames against the furniture while Afovey makes a dash for the statue. Her body disappears into the wall behind the statue, with only her wand hand protruding, and she proceeds to make quick work of the furniture barricade from close range. The sour-faced statue does its job of sheltering her but gradually disintegrates in the exchange of fire, blasted away piece by piece until it’s been completely put out of its misery; nothing more than rubble and dust.

A last bastion of overturned chairs remains, sheltering their opponent, at an angle too awkward for either of them to reach. Theseus is considering a dash for it, to a better position, when Newt’s giant blue bird screeches down from above, almost giving him heart failure. It dives behind the chairs and scoops up a small, dark-haired witch in its talons. She kicks and screams, and loses her hat, but the swooping death holds on like… well, like grim death, and delivers her to where Newt and Tina are waiting on the balcony. Theseus recognises the witch as Vinda Rosier, a known collaborator of Grindelwald’s, and possible member of his inner circle. Tina disarms Rosier smartly and has her bound in short order with _incarcerus_.

Theseus shares a look with Afovey and she nods her head towards the unlit dead-end of the corridor beyond the short flight of stairs. Theseus’s heart beats loudly in his ears as they descend into darkness, their wands drawn. Grindelwald and six others, Afovey had said. _Grindelwald_.  

There’s a figure in the gloom, bottom-heavy but too dark to make out, and coming towards them. Theseus shouts, “Stop right there!” and strengthens his _lumos_.

Behind him Tina gasps, “Queenie?”

“Hi Teenee, hi Newt, honey,” Queenie says, in a sing-song voice. She has three children huddled in front of her: muggle street urchins with ragged clothing and bare feet, two girls and a boy. They look to be about six years old.

“Queenie,” Tina says, her voice gone shaky with horror. “Let the children go.”

“Oh, I won’t hurt them,” Queenie says, playing with one of the little girls' hair. “It’s okay, honey. You’re _darling_ , aren’t you?” she says to the muggle child, stroking her cheek.

Gellert Grindelwald steps out of the shadows and comes to stand a little behind Queenie. And behind the children, the coward. He sighs. He seems to be _bored_.

“Please let them go,” Tina says again. “Please Queenie, this is madness.”

“Can’t do that until Gellert has what he wants, Teenee, sorry.” Queenie turns to Grindelwald and gives him a simpering smile. Grindelwald returns it, although his own smile doesn’t reach anywhere near his eyes.

Theseus exchanges pained looks with Afovey. There are protocols for hostage situations, and not a lot they can do for now besides keeping their wands trained on Queenie and Grindelwald.

Tina says, “What has happened to you?” in a strangled voice. Theseus notices a black leather glove making its way towards the children, a couple of inches from the floor, on a trajectory that would be blocked from both Queenie and Grindelwald’s line of sight. _Dumbledore,_ he thinks. _Thank Merlin._ He shields his thoughts with the strongest occlumency techniques he knows and hopes against hope that the others will be sharp enough to do the same.

Queenie says, “Nothing’s happened to me, I’m fine,” in sad, offended tones. She hasn’t seen the glove. The others must be occluding like mad too. “You want to come with us Tina?” she continues, “It’s not too late you know. Great things are gonna happen real soon.” She sends another adoring smile to Grindelwald and the glove rises to waist height in front of the muggle boy. Its fingers uncurl, opening it up, and lying in its palm is a yellow muggle sweet.

“He’s evil,” Tina pleads, and her acting is impeccable. “He’s killing people. Please come home.”

“He is _not_ ,” Queenie says, and she reminds Theseus of the bad-tempered little girl of the nursery rhyme; the one with a little curl right in the middle of her forehead.

The muggle boy glances to Theseus, eyes wide and questioning. He tries to nod as imperceptibly as he can. _Take it_ , he wills the child. _Take it_.

As soon as the boy’s fingers touch the sweet, Queenie and all three children vanish in the unmistakable swirl of an activated portkey.

Since he, Afovey, Tina and Newt had all seen the glove, they’re ready to open fire on Grindelwald the instant Queenie has gone. It’s Afovey’s curse that scores a direct hit though, taking Grindelwald down sideways. He rolls away into a dark recess and for a moment it’s quiet in the corridor. They all hold their breath.

Then Grindelwald’s up and coming for them with a lazy barrage of spells. It’s like facing an army in one man, he’s so strong. Theseus blocks and casts, blocks and casts, and maybe, just maybe they can hold him, all of them together.

Tina casts _olivium_ , and the stone floor around Grindelwald’s feet turns slick and wet looking. Grindelwald wobbles, but vanishes the oil with barely a scowl and a flick of his wand. “Such an irritation,” he sneers at Tina, and blasts her backwards into the staircase with a flash of pure white light. Newt roars in anger and unleashes the swooping evil.

Grindelwald summons the blue flames he had raised in Père Lachaise and Theseus sees what is going to happening moments before it does, but too late to prevent it. The bird meets a jet of ice-blue and withers to a charred lump. Grindelwald kicks the lump away from himself in annoyance and starts to cast the blue fire in earnest, another wall of oblivion which his heading, alarmingly, in Theseus’s direction.

A rush of hot air blasts past, stealing Theseus’s breath. It extinguishes Grindelwald’s flames like a child’s breath to a candle. “Albus,” Grindelwald says, and Theseus turns to see a most welcome silhouette in a trilby hat and long coat at the top of the steps.

Theseus is further forward than the others, a few steps ahead of Newt and Tina, with Afovey on his flank. Grindelwald glances between him and the ceiling in a moment of calculation and Dumbledore roars, “NO!” but too late: the ceiling comes crashing down behind Theseus, in a thunder of debris. He stumbles, caught in the cascade, arms coming up to protect his head, and loses his wand in the process.

Booming like thunder, and from somewhere much higher up through the building, two massive oak beams land on the mountain of detritus; ancient sentinels falling to their doom. One of them breaks into halves but the other bowls sideways down the rubble, and Theseus tries to scrabble back out of its way but it bounces to a stop with a sickening crunch on top of his legs. His world goes white in sheer agony.

“Theseus Scamander, isn’t it?”

Theseus twists around, and an involuntary whimper escapes him as pain shoots up his left leg. Grindelwald is approaching, still relaxed but now interested rather than bored. The debris has neatly cut them off from the others. Theseus coughs and tries to move but he’s trapped and the pain in his leg is debilitating. He feels around himself blindly for his wand but he can’t find it; can only lie there looking up as the dust clears, through a hole that goes up many levels.

Grindelwald lingers, at what would be an approximate pouncing distance for a predator, and Theseus goes still, urgently trying to think of something, anything, he can do. He hears the rubble being cleared, distantly: the others looking for him and trying to find a way through. He tries to call out to them but his voice won’t work.

Grindelwald gives him a pitying look.  “I’ve been meaning to introduce myself,” he says, “And to explain a few things.” He comes close and crouches by Theseus’s side, reaching out to brush dust from Theseus’s trousers.

Theseus tries to flinch away in revulsion, but it’s only a flinch of the mind because he can’t seem to move his body at all. It doesn’t stop him from trying.

Grindelwald sighs, disapproving of his struggles against a magic he can never hope to escape. Whatever spell Grindelwald is using to keep him silenced and immobile, it’s nothing Theseus has ever come across it before. He’s not petrified, or at least not in the magical sense. “The blood pact was a trinket only,” Grindelwald says. “Albus gave me his heart in a very real way, and I own it. Can you understand that? I own it and I’m never giving it back.”

Theseus glares at him, his only remaining weapon. Grindelwald laughs.

“Did he woo you with music and fine wine?” he says. The pupil of his dealthly white eye noticeably dilates. “Does he have you twisted around his little finger already?” He shakes his head, eyebrows lifting in the middle in mock-sympathy. “Albus has such a clever mouth, does he not? Like a spider, he weaves a silken web of words.”

He traces gloved fingers along the contour of Theseus’s face. They’re not leather gloves like Dumbledore’s, but fine cotton or silk.

“Did he use his words to ensnare you, little fly? Did you fight it at all?”

He pulls off his right glove, finger by finger, and traces the newly bare index finger down Theseus’s neck and across his chest. Theseus’s nipples pebble into peaks beneath his shirt, and he grits his teeth.

“No,” Grindelwald continues, thoughtfully. “I think you wanted to be captured didn’t you. I think you were _easy_.”

He unbuttons Theseus’s top button with a flick, and moves to the next one. “I can see that it’s too late for you already. You’ve been collected and now you’re just hanging there, languishing in his web.”

Theseus renews his efforts but the magic holding him is utterly impenetrable. He can’t help imagining the invisible threads of a spider’s web holding him in place, like the ones Grindelwald is describing. He sends a silent prayer for the others to hurry up and rescue him.

“Tell me, little fly. How does Albus like to play with his prey?” Grindelwald slides his hand inside Theseus’s shirt and circles his nipple. Theseus’s eyelids want to close but he won’t let them. “Or… how does Albus’s prey like to be played _with_?” He opens Theseus’s shirt to the navel and lowers his nose to an inch above his skin, which breaks out in gooseflesh. Grindelwald inhales deeply, closing his eyes as he draws in Theseus’s scent, as though Theseus were a fine wine. “You’re so deliciously helpless,” he murmurs. “I wonder if Albus will agree to share.”

With a rumble the debris shifts, clearing a path from the other side. Dumbledore rushes through, freezing at the sight of Grindelwald poised over Theseus. Tina is close behind. “Coward!” she yells, her wand pointing directly at them and her voice ringing. Her voice echoes in a way that’s all wrong for the space and the ferocity of it startles them all, even Grindelwald who glances to her in surprise.

“Albus,” he says again, with a strange half-smile, and vanishes.

“Gaah!” Theseus thrashes his arms, free, thank Merlin, but his wand is nowhere close. He knew the anti-apparition wards would be useless. He _knew_ it. He pushes pathetically at the ceiling beam that’s pinning his legs to the floor.

He’s expecting Dumbledore to levitate the beam, but when Dumbledore points his wand at it, the beam _disintegrates_ , and not into dust either, but into _ash_. “Did he hurt you?” Dumbledore says, voice low and furious. Theseus shakes his head, brushing flakes of ash from the skin of his bare chest.

“Don’t wait for me,” Dumbledore says grimly to Tina, and to Newt who he passes as he goes back through the passageway. Newt comes to kneel with Tina by Theseus’s side.

Tina laughs, and there are tears in her eyes. “We thought he’d killed you for sure,” she says, squeezing Theseus’s shoulder. Newt just looks relieved.

“Sorry about your swooping evil,” Theseus murmurs.

Newts nods and grimaces, and Theseus’s heart goes out to him. He can still recognise a brave face when he sees one; still knows when his little brother wants to cry.

“Your legs…” Tina says.

“The left one’s broken I’m afraid,” Theseus admits, only now acknowledging the fact for himself. It makes him feel queasy. He thunks his head back down to the floor and looks up through the levels. Sheets of paper drift slowly down to settle around them. The whole structure seems to be rotating in a way that it shouldn’t. He recognises that he’s passing out only a moment before oblivion takes him. Newt’s comforting voice is the last thing he hears, saying, “You’re alright. The mediwizards are on the way.”

 

****

 

Theseus comes around in St Mungo’s, his wand waiting for him by his bedside and his leg well on the way to being fully healed. He actually feels rather good, and hopes that he’s managed to sleep through any painful procedures that were necessary.

Afovey ducks her head into the room and grins at him. “He’s awake!” she calls, and Travers follows her in. They give their version of events together, and Theseus tries to stress, to Travers, that the anti-apparition wards hadn’t been able to hold Grindelwald. Travers nods but, predictably, assures them that Grindelwald and his followers had used portkeys. Theseus can’t press the issue without giving away Dumbledore’s secret. He doesn’t want to examine his motives for withholding information about Dumbledore from Travers because it would mean thinking about shifting allegiances, and it might mean something uncomfortable for Theseus’s loyalty to King and Country too.

As soon as they’ve gone, Dumbledore’s there, all the tight rage from earlier vanished from his face, replaced by a soft weary smile. Theseus reaches for him but Dumbledore hesitates, glancing around to the nurse, who follows him in and busies herself with the chart at the end of Theseus’s hospital bed. Theseus’s hand falters, going instead to his own chest, remembering his open shirt and the ash where Grindelwald had touched him moments before his rescue.

Dumbledore sits quietly by the bed, transfiguring the vase of flowers from white to a delicate pink, which fades through orange and all the way to sunshine yellow. When the nurse has gone, he says, “He must have found out about us somehow. I didn’t realise he knew. Did he-” He shakes his head and pulls both hands down over his face in a weary gesture, pulling the hair of his beard forwards in a point towards his chin, and sighs. “What did he do to you?”

“Nothing much,” Theseus says, doing his best to sound reassuring. He reaches out again and this time Dumbledore allows it, lacing Theseus’s fingers with his own. “I’m fine, really. He just held me down with some magic that didn’t allow me to talk, and said some mean things about you, that’s all. No harm done, alright?” To prove it he swings his legs over the side of the bed. They’re un-scarred and healthy looking. He stands experimentally, which goes well, so he gets out of bed and does a lap of the room.

“Mr Scamander!” the nurse cries from the doorway, in outrage. “Please!” She covers her eyes to save herself from the horror of his bare legs.

“Sorry, sorry,” he says sheepishly, sharing a grin with Dumbledore as he gets back under the sheet. “But I feel fine now. Will you find out when I can leave please?”

She gives him a disapproving look. “I would think it would be best to stay overnight,” she says reprovingly.

“Please?” he gives her what he hopes is a charming smile.

“Oh, very well.”

When she’s out of earshot, Theseus says, “Travers said the security held, that he didn’t get the war records after all,” hoping to steer their conversation away from his own encounter. 

Dumbledore shakes his head. “It was never the war records he was after. While you were defending level six, MacDuff was busy collecting personnel records on level two.”

“It was a diversion?” Fresh anger rises in Theseus. That slippery bastard had played them as easily as a bunch of overconfident first year Gryffindors.

“I’m afraid it looks like he was after the personnel records of Ministry employees all along. MacDuff was making copies. I think they had planned to take the copies without our knowledge but I smelled a rat and cut the copying short. Unfortunately, I wasn’t quick enough to save the originals.” Dumbledore gives him a small smile. “MacDuff really did have a portkey.”

“Well.” Theseus huffs. “At least we know what they were doing, even if we didn’t manage to stop them.”

“But we don’t know why.”

“It really is better if you stay overnight, Mr Scamander,” the nurse says, with a forceful smile on her return.

“And if I insist on leaving?”

The smile falls away. She sniffs. “Well. You can’t go unless someone signs for you, and agrees to watch over you at least for tonight.”

“I’ll sign for him,” Dumbledore says immediately, weathering her glare with a smile that puts Theseus’s effort to shame.

She shoves a clipboard at him.

“Percival Wulfric Brian?” Theseus reads, upside down. Dumbledore winks and he laughs aloud.

Being outside in the fresh air feels good. “Thanks for that,” Theseus says, buttoning his coat against the cold. It’s already mostly dark but the evening is young. There are many muggle Christmas shoppers, manoeuvring around them with bags and parcels. Dumbledore stops in the street and just stands there. He looks, quite suddenly, sad.

“What?” Theseus says, alarmed. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

“I think, perhaps, it’s best if we don’t. Anymore.”

“What?” The cold breeze buzzes in Theseus’s ears. He can’t be hearing what he thinks he’s hearing. It simply can’t be happening.

“I don’t want to get you killed, Theseus. Or worse.”

“What’s worse than getting me killed?” Theseus says, stupidly.

Dumbledore looks miserable. “We have to stop. I have to stop, it’s irresponsible.”

“What? No! You said yourself, we should live as though every day were our last.”

Dumbledore moves, like he wants to touch, his fingers twitching, but then he shakes his head and steps away instead, his eyes filling with tears. Some of the muggle shoppers walk between them. “I’m sorry. I can’t let him take you from me.” He says, turning and walking away.

It’s worse than it would have been if he’d just apparated, because Theseus has to stand there and watch him leave, reeling in shock. He distantly acknowledges that his world is once again crashing down around his ears. “But… That’s exactly what you _are_ doing!” he shouts, desperately, but Dumbledore doesn’t turn. Theseus watches him disappear into the crowd.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the long wait between the last chapter and this one. I'm a massive failure at many aspects of life and I'm afraid this is just another one. If you sent me a beautiful comment and I didn't reply, again I'm really sorry - please know that I read all the comments and that they always make my day.

 

Theseus goes home. He looks at the empty spot on the table where the fruit bowl used to be, and the empty spot on the mantlepiece where the clock used to live, and he just can’t stand it anymore.

He and Newt had grown up in North London, a newly built wizarding house in the affluent muggle neighbourhood of Belsize Park. It’s there that Theseus winds up, after hours of walking without direction. Once he’s there, visiting the nearby muggle shops he had known so well as a boy seems the natural thing to do. There are many bottles to choose from, since they’re well stocked for Christmas. Theseus buys one of everything that he thinks he might fancy, just because he can. The bottles clink together invitingly in the bag as he wanders, drawn by some long-buried instinct, to his childhood home.

The tall townhouse had been converted for muggles when his parents moved out, once he and Newt were safely off doing their own thing and the draw of sea air had proven too much of a temptation for their father. The bedroom that had once belonged to Theseus, top left, now has bars across the lower part of the window and colourful curtains: a nursery.

Theseus walks further down the street, to a house that stands empty at the end of the row. It’s a late casualty of the muggle war, abandoned by a family he had known only in passing; a muggle family now torn apart by loss. It’s easy to climb up the outside of the house onto the small flat garden-roof at the back. Primrose Hill Park is a wide expanse of blackness laid out immediately below, but beyond that the comforting lights of the city twinkle.

He makes himself at home on the flat roof. There’s something about being high up, of looking down at night time London from the hill, that makes him feel able to breathe properly, deeply, for the first time in ages. He lines his bottles up around him like glass soldiers and makes a start on the business of forgetting about Dumbledore. He had avoided the muggle beer for its new associations, but likes the cider well enough. Cider has a reputation for making the drinker melancholy however, which he could really do without, and it’s not strong enough for his purposes anyway, so he moves onto the wine. One bottle, the white, has corked, which is irritating, and the red tastes cheap and granular, so he leaves them aside and moves on to the harder stuff.

Gin tastes even worse than he remembers from his experimental years, but the white rum goes down nicely, with just the right burn to satisfy his urge for self-destruction. He drinks a lot of the rum. Muggle sailors drink rum, their father had told them about it. The drink is made from sugar cane, if Theseus remembers correctly, fermented and distilled and used to power His Majesty’s Royal Navy. Their Uncle Albert had been a Rear Admiral in the Navy, a full twenty years their muggle-born father’s senior and his infallible hero, with a sea shanty for every occasion. It had been shortly after Albert’s death that Theseus’s parents had left London for good.

The encounter with Albert that stands out most in Theseus’s memory is from shortly after the war had started, when he had been given a tiny packet of angel heart tablets. An old man by then, Albert had waited until the others were out of earshot and wheezed, “Salvation of the battle weary,” matter-of-factly, closing Theseus’s hand over the package as though it had been a new brand of tobacco rather than a baggy of contraband. “Only use them if you need them,” he had advised, “But if you do need them, _use them_ _boy_.”

The tablets have lived in Theseus’s wardrobe ever since, hidden in a false-bottomed draw and wrapped in socks. He’d all but forgotten about their existence.

“ _Accio angel hearts_ ,” Theseus murmurs with a sneer, thinking bitterly that he could use all the help he can get. He wonders idly whether Dumbledore would be able to cast from this distance and takes another swig of gin to wash the man from his thoughts. It’s just as well Theseus doesn’t have those kinds of magical powers anyway: if he really could summon them from such a distance he might almost be drunk and reckless enough tonight to use them.

Angel hearts offer elation and forgetfulness; of one’s situation, one’s self, one’s friends. Of everything. They’re extremely addictive too, and many who made it back from the war had died later in a kind of starved euphoria, having forgotten to eat or drink. The tablets are made from the distillates of felix felicis and amortentia, and other ingredients including traces of the muggle drug scopolamine in the mix, and even one drop of scopolamine could kill twenty men all on its own. Since making angel hearts is risky to the point of stupidity in any civilized wizarding society, it’s likely the tablets in his sock drawer are from exotic lands and distant shores.

He raises the bottle to his lips, refreshes his warming charm and settles in, letting his eyes and thoughts wander across the distant city. He realises now that Dumbledore had been telling him _no_ in a roundabout way all along, but that he had been too much of a damned eager pup to realise it. Albus Dumbledore had made it obvious for anyone with half a brain to see that he was still in love with Grindelwald.

Grindelwald’s words seep in like poison: _you were easy… it’s too late for you… languishing in his web…_ Theseus could never have been anything more than a toy for Dumbledore’s amusement. He’s been shamefully foolish, he sees it now; almost childishly naïve. He hates feeling foolish.  What an idiot he must seem. He’s a nobody. Just another broken man with an empty house.

It looks like a bird at first… or a bat, his woozy mind suggests helpfully, and he covers his head at the last moment to fend off whatever it is flying straight at him out of the dark. The bundle of socks collides with his forearm and lands with a soft bump in his lap. Theseus huffs, impressed with himself and annoyed that he won’t be able to brag about it later to Newt. He opens the bundle and empties out the tablets onto the palm of his hand.

They’re… pretty, a mixture of pink, purple and white, glittering softly in the low light. There’s a tiny heart shape embossed on each one, delicate work that has chipped away here and there while the tablets have been in storage.

He pushes them around his palm with a finger, content to watch them sparkle. Such little things, so harmless looking. Of course, actually taking one would be foolish in the extreme, and Theseus isn’t that much of an idiot. He will allow himself this one night of alcoholic inebriation and nobody else has to know about it but he will destroy these tablets. He should have done as much years ago.

A blast of wind from nowhere lifts them out of his hand and scatters them across the flat roof.

“Hey!” Theseus protests, frowning at the wind.

“I can’t let you take them.” Dumbledore swings down from the gabled roof above, where apparently he’s been hiding for Merlin knows how long.

Theseus stares at him. "You've been following me," he accuses. It's supposed to be angry, but falls short.

Dumbledore's expression is unreadable. He gestures to the scattered tablets. "You wouldn't like them," he says, "Not really."

“And how would you know?” Theseus sounds petulant and he knows it, and it was a stupid thing to say because he wasn’t even _going_ to take them.

“I've tried them.”

“You have?” Theseus’s brain catches up with his mouth and he shakes his head to clear it. “You said you didn't want to do this anymore, so don't follow me around. Leave me alone.”

“I signed a form at St Mungo’s to say I’d watch over you tonight.”

It’s an infuriating idea. Theseus rubs his hands over his face in exasperation. “Please,” he says, through gritted teeth, “I don’t want your pity.”

Dumbledore nods, trying to look contrite, but for once it’s a poor performance. “Is this where you used to live?”

Theseus squints at the bottle of rum to see if the muggles have cut the alcohol content. He feels that he should be more drunk, perhaps drunk enough to throw something at Dumbledore, but the bottle proclaims itself ‘40% proof’. “Not this house. Please just let me be drunk in peace.”

“Let me apparate you home,” Dumbledore suggests, “It’s getting cold out here.”

Theseus realises that his warming charm has failed and he hadn’t even noticed. He hunkers down in his nook and tries to ignore Dumbledore, which is ridiculous. He wonders if moths feel this way in the candle’s flame.

“Theseus.”

“Don’t.”

“You’ve rubbed glitter all over your face you know.”

Theseus scowls. Tears well up in his eyes and spill over, the alcohol making them easy. “What do you care?” He stands unsteadily and turns his face away from Dumbledore, ashamed to be caught in such a state. “I’ll be fine, tomorrow. Tomorrow I’ll be fine. Just… go back to Hogwarts and leave me be.” _And go back to your murdering boyfriend_ , he thinks nastily.

A hand at Theseus’s elbow startles him. He wrenches free but Dumbledore is vexingly persistent, looking for purchase to side-along apparate him and causing him to stumble. The bottle of vinegary smelling white wine spills, sloshing around their feet as they tussle. Theseus fights to remain, to be allowed his evening of misery and solitude without Dumbledore’s arrogant interference but Dumbledore just won’t give up.

“For Merlin’s sake!” Theseus yells, shoving at him hard.

Dumbledore staggers, fighting for balance, but the bottle army get under his feet and he falls, backwards, right off the edge of the roof.

“Albus!” Theseus rushes to the edge but there’s nothing but foliage and darkness below. Dread twists his chest and he starts to climb down, quickly and carelessly, not caring now if he falls too. 

“No, don’t do that,” says Dumbledore’s voice, followed by his head, and then his shoulders as he emerges from the foliage, climbing back up.

Theseus is so overcome with relief that he has to sit down. One of the white angel hearts lies within reach, an inch away from his thumb. He crushes it to dust.

Dumbledore’s hat is missing and there are leaves on his coat. They sit side by side, legs dangling and shoulders bumping. “I’m so sorry,” Theseus says eventually. “Are you hurt?”

Dumbledore holds up his hands with a rueful smile. “Not at all. Minerva’s always saying I can’t take a hint.”

The skyline tilts and Theseus is too tired fight it anymore so he just goes with it, head falling sideways and coming to rest on Dumbledore’s shoulder. Dumbledore puts an arm around him and the tears come again, silent and profuse.

“I’m the one who’s sorry,” Dumbledore says into his hair.

Dumbledore doesn’t let go. Theseus doesn’t know what it means. He doesn’t want to think about it, just wants to stay like this for a while.

“When I realised he had found out about you… You’re in terrible danger now you know.”

“Danger’s actually written into my job description.”

Dumbledore’s body jolts in amusement. He shakes his head, his beard brushing the skin of Theseus’s forehead and making him shiver. “We’re a little outside of your job description here,” Dumbledore says. “He’ll target you now, put you between us in a fight, try to use you to blackmail me and I can’t-” his voice cracks and he swallows a few times. “I wouldn’t be able to make the necessary choices.”

Theseus nods morosely. The tears have dried up but the pain is still there, thrumming through his centre like a living thing.

“But I couldn't stay away,” Dumbledore says. He sighs. “I think I made a horrible mistake earlier.”

Terrible hope rises up inside Theseus and catches in his throat like smoke. He lifts his head and studies Dumbledore’s face to be sure. “A mistake?” he says. It comes out in a croak.

Dumbledore gives him a look so pitying it would be funny under different circumstances, and Theseus is vaguely self-conscious about how he must look, drunk and puffy-eyed. Dumbledore gently wipes his cheek with a thumb and he remembers about the glitter.

“Let me sober you up.”

Theseus grimaces but nods in agreement, aware that he deserves it. Dumbledore is gentle though; he doesn’t produce a sober-up potion but instead uses his wand to draw rippling gas off Theseus’s body. It shimmers like the heat of a summer road between them, and as the inebriation lifts Dumbledore takes deep deliberate breaths, sucking in the gas until the air between them is clear. When he opens his eyes again they're half-lidded and he has a dopey expression on his face. "Now we're even," he says.

“Oh.”

He pulls Theseus close again and they rest their heads together.

The only sounds are of night birds and the familiar clatter of hooves from an occasional carriage in the next street. Every so often a pipistrelle bat flits across the sky, like tiny seekers on a mission.

“I know that… I… can’t really compare,” Theseus begins, “But-”

Dumbledore kisses him. His mouth tastes of rum, which is odd but not a bad thing. He presses their foreheads together. “I was scared and I was wrong. Can you forgive me?”

Theseus feels the echo of it in his own soul and brings their mouths back together. Really, no other answer is required. _I’ve been lonely too,_ he thinks.

Relief is evident in Dumbledore’s eagerness. He kisses Theseus enthusiastically and Theseus has to support them, leaning back with a forearm on the tiny sharp stones of the roof, lest Dumbledore get carried away and they both go tumbling off this time. It’s not the most comfortable position.

“If only we had something soft to lie on,” Theseus hints, hoping now that Dumbledore will apparate them. Directly to his lovely Dumbledore-smelling bed at Hogwarts for preference.  

“Well…” Dumbledore pulls away and stands, taking off his long overcoat. He lays the coat out on the flat roof, over the broken glass and scattered tablets, and passes a hand over it. The coat transfigures into a generously sized mattress, still coat coloured and with coat buttons in the dimples.

Theseus shakes his head, smiling, amused by how obviously Dumbledore wants him to be impressed. “The things you can do,” he says, joining Dumbledore on the mattress. It’s springy and plush, and when they lie side by side it dents into a central ‘V’ shape, pulling them down together.

A warming charm seeps over them like a blanket and without the heavy coat Theseus can feel the heat of Dumbledore’s body bleeding through his clothes. It’s easier to hold onto each other lying down, hands free to explore. Dumbledore unbuttons Theseus’s coat and slips his hands inside. He manages to lose his own waistcoat too, and once there’s nothing but thin cotton between their chests, Dumbledore’s heartbeat seems magnified somehow, the very essence of him making itself known between them. It excites Theseus; speaks to his most tender nature, and makes his own pulse rate pick up until it’s galloping alongside. He thinks about how close he came to never being allowed this again, and a soft sob escapes his lips.

Dumbledore holds him tight, so tightly that it borders on painful, but Theseus wouldn’t have it any other way. They tremble together. “Would you like me to make it rain again?” Dumbledore whispers.

“Yes,” Theseus sobs, “ _Yes._ ”

Dumbledore closes his eyes and the heavens open. Raindrops the size of knuts bounce off the giant umbrella charm that surrounds them and their impromptu bed both; a transparent tent. The noise is incredible.

“Merlin!” Theseus shouts over the hammering of the rain. The sheer volume of water is like nothing he’s seen before. It’s exhilarating.

Dumbledore’s pupils have dilated so that only a sliver of iris is visible. His breath comes quickly and Theseus can still feel the powerful engine of his heart working. He understands then, perhaps for the first time, that this is a taste of Dumbledore’s true power; what Theseus might have seen if Dumbledore had allowed him to stay when he had broken the bonds of the blood pact. And he understands why Dumbledore might have been reluctant to let him stay.

Thunder explodes in the clouds immediately over their heads and, for a moment, dark eyed and lit from different angles by flashes of lightening, Dumbledore is terrifying.

The grin falls from Theseus’s face. His own eyes go wide, more startled-rabbit than anything, and he feels like a child again, with a sudden urge to hide from this storm.

Dumbledore sits up and draws his knees to his chest. “It’s a bit bigger than I intended,” he admits, talking loudly to be heard over the din. His face has settled back into its good-natured lines and, although his eyes are still a little dark, the raw power has been shuttered away.  

“It’s like a monsoon!” Theseus agrees. Revelations of power aside, he can’t help but feel pleased to have caused a lapse in Dumbledore’s control.

A ground strike finds the earth somewhere very nearby with an almighty _BANG!_ and makes Theseus gasp. Dumbledore winces. “Let’s get inside,” he says.

Dumbledore stays on the roof, doing something that will bring the large mattress through the small window, while Theseus climbs inside, taking a quick inventory of the room: abandoned but not too filthy. He sends a blast of _scourgify_ up the chimney to clear it out and gets a fire started in the hearth. There are a few shabby curtains still hanging and he transfigures these into blankets. By the time Dumbledore climbs through holding a tiny shrunken mattress, the room has started to feel quite cosy.

The much-abused coat-mattress is re-sized yet again, this time narrower than it had been on the roof, but taller, which means that when they drag it close to the fire for warmth it also serves as a decent place to sit. Rain lashes the flimsy sash window but the thunder is muted now, behind bricks and glass.

They kick off their shoes and take their time undressing one another in the dancing firelight. Theseus has more scars, most notably the bayonet wound on his right thigh, and Dumbledore brushes them all with tender fingers. Dumbledore himself is thicker set, broader in the chest and hairier, and Theseus pushes into him, against him, lying as close as humanly possible. Skin to skin, he gives himself over to deep kisses and slow caresses. If it were possible then he would rub every part his body against every part of Dumbledore’s. There’s a glorious freedom in their nakedness, limbs entwined in the abandoned house with the storm outside. As their desire banks, their kisses turn deeper and their caresses more deliberate.

Dumbledore seems to get the message that Theseus wants to be close. He presses their bodies tightly together, pulling Theseus to him. It’s easy to find a way to move together for mutual satisfaction, Theseus’s hip in the crease of Dumbledore’s thigh and their cocks trapped side by side between their bellies. When it becomes slippery Theseus insinuates a hand too, and holds them together, making it better for them both. Their faces stay close between kisses, and they each watch the little expressions that play across the other’s face; the cues and tells of pleasure shared.

Theseus over-heats but in the best possible way. Between the fire and Dumbledore he might be melting, and Dumbledore’s cheeks are darkening pink too. There’s sweat on Dumbledore’s brow and his eyes are heavy-lidded but Theseus is the first to break, his urgency having reached limits of tolerance. He starts to demand a faster pace with his body and with his voice. It coaxes a moan from Dumbledore, but otherwise he is implacable, keeping their rhythm agonisingly slow with a solid grip on the curve of Theseus’s buttock to hold him in check.

Theseus is too hot. It’s too hot and too much but not enough and he can’t find his release, and it’s maddening, glorious. Dumbledore murmurs, “I’ll never do it again. Never again, I promise,” holding him steady, and it’s what Theseus needed. He reaches the edge of bliss and, with nowhere else to go, falls and falls, and keeps on falling for what seems like a really long time, gratified when he feels Dumbledore’s body going taut as he falls right alongside.

 

****

 

Dumbledore shakes him gently awake a few hours later. “I didn’t want you to wake up alone,” he says apologetically. He’s already dressed, and looks slightly comical in his hat with no coat. Theseus wonders when he’d recovered the hat. The fire is dead but the room has been recently warmed. “I have to see Clancy,” Dumbledore says. “Before the meeting.”  

Right, the meeting. Theseus groans. “That’s alright. Thanks, I need to get out of here too.”

They share a lingering kiss that’s not lingering enough, and Dumbledore apparates, leaving Theseus to fall back on the mattress. He allows himself a moment to ponder the wonders of life but forces himself into action before sleep can reclaim him.

The darkness of midwinter is pitiless. He uses a _lumos_ to check the roof but there are no bottles or broken glass to be seen, and all the tablets have gone. He thinks about trying to re-transfigure Dumbledore’s coat from the tweed mattress but decides he’ll only get it wrong and embarrass himself. Perhaps he can buy Dumbledore a new one; a better one.

When there’s nothing left to be done, and still a few hours before he’s required in the Ministry, Theseus is forced to admit to himself that he’s wasting time and finding excuses not to go home. He has a feeling of suspended belief that he doesn’t want to lose and going home would mean facing up to everything that’s happened to him in the past twenty-four hours. Since he’s in no way prepared for that, he apparates to Newt’s instead.

The Christmas wreath on Newt’s front door takes him by surprise, as do the tiny Portuguese fire pixies that poke their heads out of the ivy and bare their teeth at him. He does a quick re-count of weekdays in his head and is even more surprised to realise that today is Christmas Eve.

Theseus has been shying away from thinking about Christmas. He’d made plans with Leta, many months in advance, but thinking about them now doesn’t stir any kind of emotion in him at all, which is probably for the best. He’d had the vague notion of avoiding Christmas as much as possible this year. He has a bottle of Old Ogden’s and stacks of paperwork for Christmas Day, but there’s no way he can get out of their customary Christmas Eve dinner at Newt’s.

He checks himself over, casting an extra _scourgify_ and a breath freshening spell. There are pine cones amongst the wreath and he takes one, suffering a fire pixie bite to the forefinger for his theft. “You little bastard,” he hisses. The pixie sneers at him malevolently. He transfigures the hard-won pinecone into a comb and uses the polished doorknocker as a mirror to tame his hair. If he still looks like a dirty stop-out who got drunk and had sex on a mattress in an abandoned house there’s nothing more he can do about it for the time being. He knocks on the door.

Newt answers, looking sleep ruffled in checked pyjamas, his hair even more unruly than usual. “It’s rather early isn’t it?”

Theseus shrugs. Newt rolls his eyes but fastens his robe and ushers Theseus inside.

“Still coming tonight aren’t you?” Newt says.

“Yes, of course I am,” Theseus says, because of course he is, even if he only remembered about it a couple of minutes ago. He takes an apple from the fruit bowl and tosses it idly while Newt makes tea. “Look, can I bring Dumbledore?” He asks, without thinking it through.

Newt glances at him, surprised. “Yes? I mean, does Dumbledore want to come?”

“I… haven’t exactly asked him yet.”

“Tina says she’ll come.” Newt glances up again, with a guilty look this time. “I hope that’s alright?”

“Oh, I think I can live with that.” Theseus grins. “She’s great, Newt,” he adds, more softly, and means it. He remembers how fierce Tina had looked, drawing her powers to herself in the Ministry and preparing to take on Grindelwald alone.

“Yes, well.” Newt looks at the oven, at the bookcase. He looks at his desk and his briefcase, anywhere but at Theseus. “Dumbledore’s great too,” he says, glancing up briefly. “But I suppose you already know that.”

 

****

 

Finkfoot welcomes them all to the meeting of B.A.I.T. and shoos away Fawley’s minute-taking elf as the first order of business. “Yesterday evening, an hour or so after the Ministry raid, there was an attack on Morgan Clancy’s London home,” he says.

“Didn’t know you had a London home, old thing,” Stuffpot says, sounding interested.

“Yes well,” Clancy sniffs, “I don’t advertise the fact. It’s mostly for convenience.”

Theseus imagines that by ‘convenience’ Clancy means ‘somewhere to fall down drunk’ so that he doesn’t have to apparate or flue after a heavy night on the town. “Convenience and pleasure,” says a voice from the ranks of diplomats. A man called Sharif, Theseus thinks. There’s general sniggering around the table.

“Was anyone hurt?” Stuffpot asks, smiling along with the sport.

“No, just a hell of a mess,” Clancy says.

“And you’re up at Moniak now I suppose?”

Clancy sighs, curling a lip in distaste. “Temporarily, yes.” It’s the kind of distain only a spoilt brat of an heir could manage for the four-storey Scottish castle that is his family seat. Presumably Moniak Castle will at least be better warded.

“What were they after?” Sharif asks.

“They weren’t after anything,” Finkfoot says, resuming control. “We think it was retribution for Rottingham’s death last year. Most of you will know that Rottingham was one of Grindelwald’s followers, killed by the unspeakables to thwart a muggle bomb plot in Winchester Cathedral. More specifically, Rottingham was killed by Clancy, which, until yesterday, was a top-secret detail recorded only in his personnel file."

“That’s… alarmingly quick work,” Afovey observes, and the others mutter their agreement.

“Quite. Addresses are being made secret as fast as the vows can be taken,” Finkfoot says. “We expect you all to take on at least one duty of secret keeper over the Christmas period, and work in shifts to consolidate vows for others.

“There was a legilimens with Grindelwald when they raided the Ministry, I think you’ve all been briefed?” There are nods and murmurs of agreement. “Good. Queenie Goldstein is a new recruit.” Finkfoot shows a photograph of Queenie, who laughs and flutters her eyelashes. “Her legilmency is strong, and she should be considered extremely dangerous, particularly to those of us susceptible to curves.”

This is met with the kind of dirty-old-man chuckling that would put Mr Punch to shame; and an, “Oh honestly,” from Afovey.

“Dumbledore briefly managed to apprehend her and rescue the muggle hostages,” Finkfoot continues, with a deep nod that is almost a bow in Dumbledore’s direction, “But all of the intruders came prepared with pre-destined portkeys and Goldstein affected a successful escape in this manner. Any questions?”

“What happened to the muggles?” Clancy asks.

“Obliviated and sent on their way, of course,” Dumbledore says.

“Might they not have been useful witnesses?” Stuffpot protests.

“My dear old Stuffpot, you must try not to take Dumbledore at face value,” Clancy says, he eyes Dumbledore with a calculating look. “When he says ‘sent on their way’, what he actually means is questioned thoroughly but in such a way they wouldn’t even realise they were being questioned, and then walked all the way home to their very front doors with their hands held all the while. Isn’t that right my soft-hearted friend.”

Dumbledore gives him an unimpressed look in return. “More or less. Although the hovel they were living in had no front door to speak of, Morgan.”

“Well?” Stuffpot prompts, “Did they offer any useful answers or not man?”

“The girl sang me a song in French, one that she hadn’t known before meeting Queenie,” Dumbledore says. “Claire de Lune? I’m sure you all know it. The child didn’t speak French otherwise. It seems Queenie was broadcasting while they were together, but the song itself – I don’t know. It could be something or nothing.”

“Have you asked the other woman about it? She’s French, isn’t she?” Stuffpot demands of Finkfoot.

“Which brings me neatly to my next point,” Finkfoot says, nodding in acknowledgement. “The woman, Rosier, thought to be very close to Grindelwald, perhaps as close as his right hand, is in custody in the dungeons as we speak.” Fawley clears his throat and Finkfoot glances down. “I do beg your pardon, she’s in custody _on level ten_ as we speak. We’ve petitioned the Wizengamot for a veritaserum exemption, and expect the request to be granted within a few days. Until then it seems unlikely we will get anything useful from her.”

Theseus shivers at the mention of veritaserum. The Ministry uses it in extreme cases and by special permission only. Theseus understands the legislation and relevant procedures but it bothers him like nothing else. There’s something base inside of him that reacts with horror and intrigue both whenever he imagines its application. On the one hand he’s drawn to it with a fascination bordering on the perverse, and yet his worst nightmares, worse even than the ones about the war, are scenarios where he’s forced to drink it himself. He has always steered well clear, on the rare occasion a petition has been granted.

“Dumbledore? I think you’d better explain your own theory,” Finkfoot says, taking his seat as Dumbledore stands.

“Essentially, I’ve been looking into the possibility that the Méras deck of tarot cards and the stolen records could be used in combination, and thus be part of a wider plot,” Dumbledore says, gaining the full attention of everyone at the table. “Perhaps you are aware of the practice of Écrire le Coeur?”

“Perhaps you’d better give us a quick refresher, Dumbledore.” Sharif quips, and Theseus silently agrees. He’s never even heard of it.

“Écrire le coeur, literally ‘writing the heart’, is the practice of… well, take an institution, Hogwarts for example, and an ordinary pack of cards. A powerful seer could bind the key players of that organisation to particular cards in the deck. So, to my mind I would allocate the King of Spades to Professor Keel Lesivius, Head of Slytherin house; Hearts to various Gryffindors, Diamonds to Ravenclaws, Clubs to Hufflepuffs, and then nominate the remaining cards down through the suits to the most influential personalities as applicable to that particular playing card. I myself might be the knave of hearts for example.”

“Ha!” Davies exclaims, from his seat next to Sharif. Everyone turns to stare. Davies is the quiet type who rarely speaks at all. “Sorry, sorry,” he mumbles, “Do carry on.” Theseus makes a mental note to ask Dumbledore about it later.

“The pack might then be wielded to shape events within the organisation,” Dumbledore continues. “It would require enormous effort and preparation, and attention to detail is critical, and even then, it’s not what muggles would call an exact science.

“But with the major arcana of the Méras deck, and in conjunction with Queenie Goldstein; if her powers of legilimens are anything like they’re purported to be, Grindelwald might hope to hold significant influence over the Ministry of Magic, right down to decisions taken in this very room. The personnel files provide names and addresses, yes, but my worry is the information they’re really after are details that would facilitate allocation of the cards: project histories, personal interests, specific training, library records and so on.”

There’s silence while they all digest this.

“But this is awful!” Stuffpot says. “Something must be done.”

It is awful. Theseus feels incredibly selfish for wallowing in his feelings for Dumbledore while poor Tina has been losing her sister all along. He briefly considers how it would feel to lose Newt to Grindelwald, and the idea makes him so angry that he sits up taller in his seat. Stuffpot’s right: They all have to do something. _Theseus_ has to do something.

Travers stands and clears his throat, and the delegates reluctantly abandon their contemplations of mind control and turn to listen. “We were right about the Binky women,” Travers reports, “Jemima and Alberta were tortured and murdered when they wouldn’t reveal the secrets of the cards. We suspect Grindelwald murdered Eloise Binky, the female child, in an attempt to sever the bloodline, in the belief that the gift travels down the female line. Having consulted an expert in the field however, we have reason to believe that Roland Binky, the sole surviving Binky, may also have inherited his mother’s gifts. We have therefore placed Roland Binky, and the McNally cousins caring for him, into protective custody before Grindelwald can come to the same conclusion.”

They break for an early lunch, since it’s Christmas Eve. Dumbledore makes a beeline for Theseus and they go together to the lunch trolley. “I don’t know about you,” Dumbledore says, wrapping sandwiches in napkins and secreting them about his person, “But I could use a breath of fresh air.”

 

****

 

They walk along the Victoria Embankment, eating the smuggled sandwiches and ascribing playing cards to Hogwarts professors past and present. Dumbledore dresses subtly differently in the school holidays. He has another coat, this one heavier, and Theseus wonders if it’s new. His hat has a wider brim, more of a fedora like Theseus’s own, which suits him, as does his cream coloured scarf, although Theseus isn’t sure about the walking cane. It seems an unnecessary affectation.

There aren’t many muggles out walking, presumably because they don’t have the benefit of magic to counteract the cold weather. The bench with the best view is free, and Theseus impulsively includes Dumbledore in the warming charm he casts.

“Thanks,” Dumbledore says, loosening his scarf.

It’s rush hour for the smaller boats on the Thames and the muggle river workers are ferrying their wares to and fro. Theirs is a different city; a different world. Theseus glances sidelong. Dumbledore is serene, watching the boats go by. Now would be the opportune moment to invite him to Newt’s, although he will almost definitely have other plans by this late stage. Theseus clears his throat. He’s going to ask anyway because he’s not a coward. He _has_ to ask since he’s already mentioned it to Newt. “What will you do, this evening?” he says, knowing that he sounds clumsy and not at all suave.

“Do you need any socks?” Dumbledore’s eyes stay on the river. “I could teach you how to make them.”

“Would you come to Newt’s with me? It’s something of a tradition we have. My turn really this year, but with things being the way they are…”

Dumbledore turns and beams at him, unashamedly delighted. “I’d love to.”

It’s too much and Theseus has to look away, embarrassed. He can’t keep the smile from his own face though, so he looks down at his gloves and fidgets with the fingers. What he wants to do is pull Dumbledore in by the collar, but of course he can’t, not out in public.

Dumbledore produces a plump orange from his coat pocket. “Can I tempt you with a slice?” he offers.

It takes the remainder of their break for Theseus to teach Dumbledore his mother’s charm for peeling and separating the orange segments without making a mess. Citrus fireworks bursts over his tongue like tiny victory celebrations and he can’t tell whether the extra warmth is in his imagination or if he’s overdoing the warming charm, but Dumbledore doesn’t comment.

 

****

 

After lunch the unspeakables report, which means it’s the turn of Ray Olistaire, Clancy’s boss. Clancy is sharp but Olistaire is sharper still, and from a very different family background. There’s still a hint of Merseyside in his voice when he speaks. “There have been two more gatherings since Paris,” Olistaire says, “One in Austria that you should already have been briefed on, and another only a week ago in Turin. Grindelwald conjured the same visions he used in Père Lachaise on both occasions. We all know that he’s a seer and these visions trouble us. There are those of us in this room who remember the war all too well, who can’t sleep for remembering it. It is any surprise that ordinary wizards and witches would do anything to avoid another muggle war? The muggle technologies are developing at such a rate that they could almost exterminate themselves, and many of us along with them. To avoid this, wizards who don’t share Grindelwald’s vision will follow him nevertheless. We must work closely with our colleagues across Europe and debunk the prophesy if at all possible.”

“And if the prophecy is real?” Dumbledore says.

A murmur ripples around the table. “You believe this to be the case?”

“He has never had a vision that wasn’t true.” Dumbledore says, as serious as Theseus has ever seen him. “The fallacy here is gathering followers to himself in the pretence that somehow the vision can be avoided. If it is a true prophesy then it will happen regardless. Grindelwald may even be the cause. He is well aware of this. He is using the future as a form of propaganda.”

It’s a miserable thought. “Then we need to educate people about the nature of prophesy,” Olistaire says, nodding thoughtfully.

Dumbledore glances around the room. “With your permission?” Olistaire gestures for Dumbledore to speak and retakes his own seat. Dumbledore stands. “There are always those who see the end of the world and doom-say,” he says. “And since none of us can live forever, the doomsayers are right: all of our worlds must end. I do not think a discussion of prophesy is the way to win over would-be Grindelwald supporters though. He is a true seer. If we get into a battle for people’s spiritual inner-eyes with him then we could be setting ourselves up to lose.”

“What then?” Afovey asks, sounding as lost as Theseus feels.

“We fight for people’s hearts.” Clancy lets out a soft snort of derision and Dumbledore turns on him. “I’m serious. Grindelwald kills indiscriminately. We keep prominent muggle-borns popular, embrace and encourage our muggle heritage and relations. There is a tendency to fear what is foreign but if the muggle in question is your beloved brother-in-law or nephew then you’re less likely to fear them; a lesson our cousins in America are yet to learn, with their ban on mixed marriage. Have you liaised with the muggle PM?” he asks Fawley, or rather he looks at Fawley but everyone knows he’s really asking Finkfoot.

“Not yet,” Finkfoot replies.

“We have to believe that the people we’re fighting for are good, on the whole, and worth fighting for.” Dumbledore looks around at each of them, briefly catching Theseus’s eye. “It’s easy to become complacent and see fellow wizards as narrow minded. The reality is that sometimes they have good reasons for being that way. Be patient. Be persistent.

“And it’s easy to see muggles as dangerous and a threat to wizarding society, with their new machines and inventions. They’re the same as us. To strike a flame we use wands where they use matches but a wizard with a broken wand also has to strike a match. We are all people, feeling the same feelings. Be brave. Lead by example.”

There are long sessions throughout the afternoon, led by nobody in particular, where each of the different teams discusses tactics. Various methods are put forward for encouraging Rosier to talk, just in case the petition for veritaserum is denied, and it’s a conversation that makes Theseus squirm. Afovey makes a quip about Grindelwald branding his followers, and, when asked what she means, she cites the strangely shaped scar that Queenie had been wearing. It turns out that nobody else had noticed this scar. “I was rather distracted at the time,” Theseus says defensively.

The scar alarms Dumbledore. “Are you certain?” He sketches a shape onto a blank piece of parchment and shoves it under Afovey’s nose. “Like this?”

“Could have been,” Afovey says, turning the parchment, “Yes, I think that’s it.”

“Please look closely.”

“Yes, I think so. Why? What is is?”

“It’s a powerful dedication charm,” Dumbledore says, looking deeply concerned. “The symbol is a cyclops’ eye.”

Afovey squints at the sketch. “It looks nothing like an eye,” she decides. “What does it do?”

“Assuming it was formed during a Lycian Ritual, it will have massively augmented her powers of influence and bound her to her new master.”

Theseus grimaces, making a silent vow to help Tina in whatever way he can.

Finkfoot comes to stand behind Afovey and views the sketch over her shoulder. “What does it mean for our plans?” he says.

“I’m not sure. Nothing good.” Dumbledore sighs, pulling at his beard. “Leave it with me.”

“Well? Go on then,” Finkfoot says, looking up at the rest of the room. “It’s Christmas. Meeting dismissed.”

Theseus makes his way out with the others. Dumbledore is still shoulder to shoulder with Finkfoot, pouring over the diagram, but as Theseus nears the door he looks up sharply, as though Theseus had said his name. “Theseus!” he calls, over the hum of conversation. A lot of people turn to look and Theseus acknowledges him with a nod, trying for nonchalance. “What time should I be there, this evening?” Dumbledore asks loudly.

“Eightish?” Theseus keeps his voice casual and saunters out of the room with the rest. On the inside though, he’s a hot mess. Dumbledore just announced to everyone that he will be spending Christmas Eve with previously-assumed-to-be-straight-boy Theseus. He might as well have added it as an item on the agenda: ‘Theseus Scamander is Now the Property of Dumbledore’. He could have fit it in just before ‘Any Other Business’.

Travers shoots Theseus a disapproving look on their way to the apparition point. Inappropriate laughter tries to fizz out of Theseus like champagne bubbles but he does his best to keep a cork in it.

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Albus x Theseus fanart](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20231281) by [DreamsConstellation](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreamsConstellation/pseuds/DreamsConstellation)




End file.
